


champion.

by killmongersgurl



Category: Black Panther (2018), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-24
Updated: 2018-12-28
Packaged: 2019-04-27 04:52:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 35,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14418090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/killmongersgurl/pseuds/killmongersgurl
Summary: an ancient god forced to roam an equally ancient world while living in a technically young body sounded like the beginning of a horribly corny joke. but it was erik’s reality.





	1. prequel.

_prequel_.

* * *

 

N’Jadaka should have been the exception to the rule.

A ragged gasp slipped past his dry throat as he ran into the night, a cluster of low murmurs touching his ears as the voices followed after him. He could barely understand what they were saying and he didn’t want to, quite frankly. His thighs and legs burned while the inside of his chest ached for relief. He could practically hear his entire body calling out to him over those voices and begging him to _just stop_ , something that forced him to consider that lone drop of cold sweat sliding down the curve of his nose.

Was this anguish? _Desperation_?

These were two things he had never felt before. Feelings like desperation and anguish were reserved and set apart exclusively for the weak and the powerless, like newborn animals and humans. Not for a god or goddess. Not for a demigod or demigoddess. Not for an ancestor. Especially not for _him_ , N’Jadaka, the champion of Sekhmet. N’Jadaka, the cherished one of Sekhmet. N’Jadaka, the great and powerful goddess Sekhmet’s most beloved creation. Yet as the wind picked up around him and the voices grew louder— _closer_ —it all urged him to ignore the burning and that detestable desperation to continue running.

There was no point in running away or hiding in the ancestral plane. He knew this. The ancestors saw everything, the most high knew everything, and his creator? _She was angry_. Sekhmet’s anger was normally a source of amusement and entertainment for him. Both her great strength and power were boundless, and he loved to watch the way she demonstrated it all before him as a way of teaching her precious student. But for the first time in almost a millennia, since she formed him with her very fingertips, she was angry with him.

_With N’Jadaka_.

Her cherished one.

Her most beloved creation.

Her champion.

That alone was enough to make him forget common sense.

Structure and order were both held in high esteem in the ancestral plane. As such, disobedience was not tolerated. Not on behalf of the gods or goddesses. Not on behalf of the demigods or demigoddesses. Especially not on behalf of the champions, no matter who their supreme was. But N’Jadaka…

_He should have been the exception to the rule_.

A vine shot out from a bush’s root, wrapping around N’Jadaka’s ankle and pulling him to the ground. He fell with a harsh grunt as he grabbed for the grass in a desperate attempt to crawl away as that vine pulled him backward. That ridiculous word made him grit his teeth with a growl. _Desperation_. Such a disgusting word had no place in his vocabulary, much less in his heart. But as those murmuring voices drew closer to him, louder and clearer, that sharp feeling of desperation was all he could focus on to keep him going.

The voices quieted down. All he could hear were the sounds of crickets and the occasional roar of a panther. This was how the ancestral plane normally sounded on a night like this. It was beautiful, almost calming enough to make him forget the predicament he’d gotten himself into.

“N’Jadaka!” This voice burst through the silence like molten lava. The sound of it was deep and raw, the vocal equivalent to a small tremor in the earth after a powerful hurricane. “Champion of Sekhmet! You show your back to us and run? Have you no shame?”

The vine gave his ankle a hard tug, forcing him to release the blades of grass in his hands. He simply grabbed for another patch and swallowed. _Desperation_. He clenched his jaw. “There is no shame when death is concerned. It matters not to me. Release me and I’ll only continue!”

“It matters not to _you_ , but do you not think of your creator?” a new voice asked. It was sharp and high-pitched, almost like a shrill flute. It made him swallow. “Do you not think of your supreme and how you dishonor her? Or do you simply refuse?”

The vine around his ankle flipped him onto his back, forcing him to face his own flock of executioners. That alone had him prepared to seal his fate, to say something smart and disrespectful to force them to end his humiliation. But then he saw her. _Sekhmet_. Just a glimpse of her deep brown skin peeking out of the slit of her red dress made him sit on his knees—immediately and at once.

N’Jadaka could feel the eyes of the gods and ancestors boring into him as he clasped his hands at his back and looked away. He never cared much for them, but his creator and his supreme? He didn’t dare to look her in the eyes after such a blatant display of disrespect.

“He must be cast out,” yet another voice declared. “He has brought shame onto us! Onto _you_ , great Sekhmet!”

Silence weaved its way into the stiff air as everyone awaited Sekhmet’s response.

N’Jadaka imagined his creator staring down at him with those keen eyes as she thought, giving him the very same look she gave anyone else who incurred her wrath. Normally, he would have been at her side, watching with glee as the unfortunate soul quivered before her and she taught him the proper way to punish someone. For this and this alone, he squared his shoulders and straightened his back as he prepared himself for his punishment.

A lone panther growled.

“Bast,” his creator spoke. The sheer power laced within her voice made him lurch forward with a sharp grunt and brace his hands onto the ground as he fell forward. She made no move to acknowledge this. “What say you?”

He hesitated before looking up. Bast, despite how competitive she was, never could deny the soft spot she had for her frequent challenger’s champion. She was the most high, the mightiest and most powerful of them all, yet she was the kindest. More lenient. This gave him hope as he looked between her and her own champion, T’Challa.

Bast raised her chin as she regarded him, before looking away.

N’Jadaka’s heart fell. He grabbed for the grass. “No.”

The murmuring voices returned as the wind picked up. It formed a circle around him, one that forced him to squint his eyes as it blew and whipped his locks all about.

“N’Jadaka, former champion of Sekhmet—”

“ _No!_ ” he interrupted with a growl, but they paid him no mind. “I am N’Jadaka! Champion of Sekhmet! The cherished one! These titles have been  _mine_ from the day I was formed, and will _remain_ as such from now and forevermore—”

“You are hereby banished from the ancestral plane!”

“You cannot banish me!” he argued as he held his forearm before his eyes, shielding them from little rocks and pieces of dirt. He could barely hear himself as the wind grew stronger and the voices amplified. He could feel himself going hoarse from attempting to overpower both forces. He pushed himself to stand up, only for that forsaken vine to tug him right back down to his rightful place: on his knees. “You _cannot_ banish _me_!”

The force of the wind made him brace his hands onto the ground for some sort of support. Those blades of grass had quickly become a sense of comfort and familiarity for him, so he grabbed for them at once. They slipped through his fingers time and time again, but he continued to grab for them as he finally looked to his supreme. He wanted to beg for her forgiveness, to plead his case with her.

As he squinted and peered through the wind’s gusts, all he could see was T’Challa watching him with a pointed look of grief. Beside him, Bast placed a hand onto Sekhmet’s shoulder as his supreme… looked down.

She was letting them cast him out.

Sekhmet was _allowing_  them do this to _him_ : her cherished one and her most beloved creation. 

_Her champion_.

N’Jadaka opened his mouth and released a scream.


	2. part one.

_part one._

* * *

The heart-shaped herb was the ancestral plane’s most treasured resource. Just one bite of this glowing little plant would endow whomever ingested it with boundless strength, strength which was only to be acquired by the highest beings within the plane. Entire bushes were made available and presented to the demigods and demigoddesses, to the gods and goddesses, and to the ancestors, but not to the champions— _never_ to the champions. Structure and order were both held in high esteem within the plane, and for this, they were not to be taken lightly. Whomever was assigned to a particular role was set in this role unless and until the most high declared differently. Gods and goddesses were to remain gods and goddesses, demigods and demigoddess were to remain demigods and demigoddess, ancestors were to remain ancestors, and champions were to remain champions.

Yet N’Jadaka couldn’t help wondering, _what if?_

A slow roll of thunder filled the air, practically yanking him from his thoughts. He looked up just in time to catch a flash of lightning flitting through the night sky before rushing to seek refuge underneath a tree as gusts of wind tousled his dreads. He pushed his fingers through his hair and pursed his lips as he crouched down to sit on his haunches, allowing himself to properly observe the glowing plant that sat in the palm of his hand as the rain fell around him.

The soft pitter-pattering of rain was a sound N’Jadaka always welcomed whenever he roamed the ancestral plane on a late night, such as this. Despite how sporadically those little raindrops fell from the sky before splatting against a surface, they always soothed him. It never failed to turn the air that surrounded him into a hazy mist, urged his eyesight to become foggy, and made everything else feel mellow. The rain was a powerful force of nature, one which had the strength and authority to take full control of any aura, atmosphere, and dwelling place before bending either one according to its will. It almost had him convinced that the rain was a god itself.

And he was jealous.

Jealousy was a common trait amongst every being that dwelled within the ancestral plane, even the animals. These were all creatures who had a tendency of being incredibly arrogant, almost to a fault, and N’Jadaka was not excluded from this. This jealous streak that coursed through his veins only served to feed into his innate curiosity and constant search for knowledge. As such, it was never strange or shocking for anyone to find him making new discoveries or thinking up new theories. He was an inquisitive creature who possessed a brain that never stopped working, one who was brilliant and knew it well, something that Sekhmet constantly warned him about.

“I am the champion of Sekhmet, the destroyer,” he would always counter without missing a beat. “ _You_ are my supreme. I am safe under _your_ charge, under _your_ wing.”

Sekhmet would always grace him with a charming smile because she knew. They both did, along with everyone else within the plane. As her champion, it was his assignment to fight for her and by her side during battle, but it was known that she would do the same for him. Without question. She had taken her time with him on the day of his creation, carefully molding and sculpting his figure with a fine mixture of the ancestral plane’s purest dirt and crushed seeds taken from a ripe heart-shaped herb. She bent her back and fell to her knees, dirtying her very fingertips in order to conceive him—her cherished one and most beloved creation. As ruthless and as brutal as his supreme was, he had been the only one to ever receive her love.

But what if he had _his own_ champion? A cherished one to call his own? What if _he_ possessed limitless power? What if _he_ was a true god?

Another clap of thunder resounded with a _crash!_ , a rumbling echo trailing after it as lightning flashed again.

The corners of his mouth curved up and into an almost impish little smile as the lightning cast a shine upon the plant. _It was beautiful._ Rather than reporting this stray plant to the most high or to his supreme after finding it so far from its bush a few days ago, he kept it hidden for himself. He had been coming back to revisit it since making this discovery, thoughts of this plant filling his thoughts whenever he was unable to go see it. Whether it was during battle, sparring, sex, conversation, jesting or even prayers, this little plant would sneak its way into his mind. He was already strong and powerful, his supreme made sure of this, but he quickly found himself wanting to know just how good it felt to be as powerful as her. Such thoughts bordered on blasphemy, he knew this, but he simply couldn’t keep himself from imagining the possibilities.

N’Jadaka took the plant between his fingers, turning it over a few times under his watchful eyes. “How could such a little thing possess such great power?”

The plant only continued to glow, as if it was winking.

A low chuckle slipped past his lips before he parted them, allowing him to release a sharp breath he had no idea he’d been holding. He tore his gaze from the plant to scan his surroundings. There was a thick blanket of fog hiding the trees and creating a dusky shield beneath the clouds, a sight that forced him to squint his eyes to see clearly. This made him clench his teeth and peel his eyes wide open in defiance, because there that rain went again: making him do things outside of his own volition as if it had control over him. As if it owned him. As if it was his supreme. But he already had one, and this was a supreme who would always protect him and ensure that he was taken care of. And if he ate from this plant, _he_ would be the one doing the protecting.

He would be the supreme.

He would have his own champion.

He would be like the rain.

Pride filled N’Jadaka’s belly at the thought. He closed his eyes, brought the plant to his lips, bit down and drank from its nectar. A shout immediately shot through his eardrums, followed by another roll of thunder. The sound was harsh this time, more volatile and almost angry as Sekhmet’s face appeared behind his closed lids. He fell to his knees with a groan and forced his eyes open, just in time to see his veins emitting a purple glow that shined through his ribbed skin.

_She knew._

And she was angry.

N’Jadaka cast the plant aside with a ragged grunt and stood, preparing to run.

_____

Erik shot up in his bed with a sharp gasp. A harsh grunt slipped past his dry throat as his chest rose and fell with heavy pants, his eyes frantically bouncing around his bedroom. He couldn’t name what he was searching for, mostly because he really had no clue, but he knew one thing for sure: he wasn’t in the ancestral plane. Not anymore, and he hadn’t been there in about one thousand years.

 _A dream_. That’s all it was.

It was the very same dream which had been plaguing him since he’d been cast out of his home—his _true_ home—but now his home was New York. Fucking Harlem. Just like it had been for the past four years. N’Jadaka, the champion of Sekhmet. N’Jadaka, the cherished one of Sekhmet. N’Jadaka, the great and powerful goddess Sekhmet’s most beloved fucking creation had been stripped of his titles and reduced to Erik Stevens.

Erik. The Harlem native.

 _Harlem_.

His blatant defiance was reason enough to have him executed, but Sekhmet couldn’t bear the thought of his death. She refused to even consider it. So she simply cursed him to roam the earth for five millennia as an atonement for his sins and sent him on his way. Sometimes he still felt the collective presence of the ancestors as he went about his days, along with the sound of their murmuring voices. Despite the part they played in his exile, he couldn’t deny just how calming it was to know that they were still with him, because he still missed his home.

This was all seen as mercy. _Mercy_!

He honestly would have preferred to simply die an insanely gruesome and horrible death at the hands of that brute, Hanuman, than to be forced to mingle with the humans, but his supreme—

Erik closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose, and released a slow sigh. He swallowed.

His _former_ supreme. Sekhmet loved him far too much to kill him or have anyone else do so in her place and honor. Every single one of the beautiful scars that used to decorate his skin were taken away from him as a result, along with more than half the strength of his powers. He was shocked to learn that he had been allowed to keep his powers in the first place, much less that much, and was even happier to know that he was still five paces ahead of the humans. This was probably a gift from Bast, one that made him want to please both her and Sekhmet. He wanted to make them proud of him, to show the two goddesses that he learned his lesson and prove to them just how sorry he was.

So he was forced to adapt.

The name _Erik_ stirred something deep within him the first time he heard it while wandering about in Germany, about three years after being cast out. It meant “honorable king.” _Honorable king_. He was far from honorable and even father from being fit to be a king, but he wasn’t too proud to admit that it was an impressive name, even for the humans. He immediately took it as his own, allowing both the name and its meaning to lift his spirits during his exile.

After this, he quickly decided that it would be in his best interest to spend his time going to school and accumulating as much knowledge as he could. It didn’t take long for him to become bored with this before he found an interest in the military, simply because fighting was what he had been created to do—but mostly because he was impervious to death. However once he discovered that he also couldn’t age, he found himself being forced to constantly relocate before anyone could catch on.

Travel. Settle. Adapt. Leave.

Travel. Settle. Adapt. Leave.

 _Travel. Settle. Adapt. Leave_.

He would do this over and over every 25 years, gathering as much wealth and knowledge as he possibly could from the environment he found himself in, until he would have to move again and adapt to another culture and create a new life.

It was a tiring cycle. A vicious one. One that had him stuck in Harlem.

 _Fucking Harlem_.

A lone drop of sweat glided down the curve of Erik’s nose. It itched but he felt no need to scratch at it, because for some reason, it reminded him that he needed to get up and prepare to begin his day. There were a few errands that he needed to run, something that he just had to do because he was living amongst the humans. The mere thought was enough to make him shove the sheets that covered his legs aside and stand to make his way to the bathroom.

“Bet T’Challa woulda loved minglin’ with these fuckin’ humans,” he grumbled. He finally raised a hand to slap that drop of sweat away. It was starting to piss him off. “Shoulda cast that nigga out. Old weirdo, prissy, human lovin’ ass.”

A cluster of low murmurs touched his ears.

 _The ancestors_.

They didn’t seem to appreciate his words, not that he particularly cared too much. Had he been back in the ancestral plane, he would have immediately offered his apologies and paid his respects whether he meant it or not. But he wasn’t in the ancestral plane. He’d been cast out—almost one thousand years ago. And he was stuck in Harlem.

Fucking. Harlem.

“Fuck y’all,” he declared as he kicked the bathroom door open. “I meant that shit and you know it. Kiss my black ass.”

Erik waved a hand and a gust of wind swung the bathroom door shut.

_____

The fresh and crisp air of the autumnal season had come and gone. It took all of its harvesting crops, crunchy and multicolored leaves, oversized pumpkins and Halloween celebrations with it, leaving only the harsh and cold winds. Just in time for winter to swoop right in, and it swooped into Harlem quite comfortably this year. A little _too_ comfortably, some would say.

Erik strongly concurred.

Despite there being no snow, this winter was undoubtedly one of the coldest (if not the coldest) that he had ever experienced during his time on earth—and he had been stuck on this godforsaken planet for almost one thousand years. The fall weather which had just passed should have given everyone a clue as to just how cold the following season would be. Instead, Old Man Winter sneaked up on them all, thus making it absolutely imperative for one to step out of their home with at least three layers of clothing in order to shield themselves from the frigid weather. If there was one thing he hated more than Harlem itself, it had to be the winters the city hosted.

And he hated Harlem.

Erik rushed into the grocery store with a shuddering groan, pulling his coat closer to himself as the sight chill of the building set into his bones. A champion getting chills? The ancestors weren’t saying anything, nothing he could hear, but he was sure that they were laughing at him. He wouldn’t hesitate to do so if the positions had been switched. He resisted the urge to roll his eyes and grabbed a shopping basket before trudging down an aisle. This had to be a quick trip. He just needed food and some extra shit that would allow him to make some more.

“I’m only ten minutes late!” a woman declared. “You’re really gonna charge me twenty more dollars on top of the sixty I’m already supposed to pay for these flowers over _that_ shit?!”

“Yes! That is our policy! When you’re late, you pay!”

“Fuck you!”

There the humans went again. Just _humaning_ it up.

Erik ignored the argument and continued down the aisle before a bright orange sticker caught his eye.

 _ **Previously 8.99**_ , it read in black bolded letters. _Now being sold at 6.99. Buy two and get the third half off!_

That was all he needed to see. He grabbed twelve boxes of penne noodles and placed them into his basket. It was a ridiculous amount of pasta, but it was necessary. The more boxes he had stocked up in his kitchen, the less time he would have to spend shopping, running errands, and interacting with the humans.

“Our policy is written on the back of the receipt, miss! You should have been more careful and read it over if you planned on being late.”

“If I _planned_ — I’m coming from work! Your mother should have been more careful and planned to swallow your pasty ass!”

Erik choked on a laugh. As annoying as the humans were, he couldn’t lie and say that they never provided him with good entertainment. He needed to see exactly who this woman was. He quickly made his way out of the aisle and rounded a corner to follow the sound of the agitated voices, only to be met with the sight of the store’s red-faced florist facing off against a determined woman across the counter. 

His brows jumped as he took her form in.

This was a big woman. A formidable woman coated in dark skin that looked it had been dug up from the purest and untainted soil on earth. An image of Bast’s smile immediately popped into his head. Did the most high have a hand in creating this one?

The woman released a soft sigh. She leaned forward to brace her elbows onto the counter before placing her face into her open palms with a shake of her head. “I’m sorry. It’s not your fault. You’re just doing your job.”

“It’s okay, miss.”

“It’s just that I just started a new job and I know that’s not an excuse for my behavior, but I’m pretty sure that my boss already hates me and I need this bouquet to kiss his ass and I already—“

“It’s okay, miss,” the florist repeated. The red tint of his face had gradually faded into a light flushing of his cheeks as he nodded. He watched the top of her head with what seemed to be slight empathy. “I work retail. Trust me when I say that I understand.”

She chuckled. “I just need some time to think. Would that be okay with you?”

“Of course, miss. Just let me know when you’re ready to settle on a decision.” At that, the florist stepped to the side to begin working on a few floral decorations.

The woman took a deep breath and shook her head before twisting her neck to look at Erik.

He blinked and returned the look. All of a sudden, he was nervous as she watched him. No, not nervous— _intrigued_.

“Shit, nigga, can I have my face back?!”

Maybe it was _Sekhmet_ who had a hand in creating this one.

Erik shook that off and set his jaw. “Damn, I cant look at you?”

“Not like that!”

The sharp feeling of embarrassment made his stomach lurch with immediate discomfort at her blatant exposure, but he didn’t look away. As if he would allow some loud human shame _him_ , the former champion of Sekhmet the destroyer—the great and powerful goddess’ cherished one, and most beloved creation—into looking away from her. So he simply tightened his grip on his basket’s handle and approached her at the counter. She didn’t take one step back or even flinch. In fact, as the florist watched him carefully from the side of his eye, she raised her chin to regard her challenger, almost daring him to do or say something.

That defiant look in her eyes made him want to say something smart, just to get her riled up and yelling again. He honestly probably would have entertained the idea if it weren’t for those errands that needed to be taken care of. Once he was done here, he would have to make his way to the mechanic and to the library. He had no time to bump egos with some woman in a grocery store as he held an entire basket of noodles.

Erik pulled his wallet out of his pocket, took a $100 bill out, and placed it onto the counter.

“Aye,” he called out to the florist as he maintained his eye contact with the woman. The nervous man immediately rushed over to the contesting pair. “This is for that bouquet. Give her the change.”

“Of course, sir!”

The woman’s mouth fell open and her brows jumped.

He almost smirked. Now, _that_ was more like it. Without another word, he turned his back to her and left to resume his shopping as the florist managed her order. Her eyes followed after him until he turned a corner and entered another aisle—he could _feel_ it—and it only served to make pride surge through his veins.

“Hey, pretty boy!”

Erik glanced at her from the corner of his eye. That big bouquet of flowers was perched in her arms almost comically as it took up more than half of her face. He resumed looking up and down the shelves.

“Thank you,” she began. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I’m a rich nigga. It’s cool.”

The woman scoffed. It was filled with such potent disgust that it almost made him smile. “And I’m sorry for being such a bitch. That was wrong. You didn’t deserve that. I don’t even know you.”

“Did you know that florist?”

“I followed you to apologize and thank you for what you did. Not to get a sermon, pretty boy.”

“My name is Erik,” he spoke before he could catch himself. This made him hesitate. Since when did he just blurt shit out like that? He hesitated before glancing at her again. She looked completely unamused with him. “Erik. Not pretty boy.”

She snorted. “You don’t look like an Erik.”

He was this close to telling her that it was because he wasn’t.

“You gon’ tell me your name?”

“Ajita.”

Erik walked further into the aisle.

Ajita followed.

“That’s Indian,” he mused aloud as he took a bottle of seasoning and placed it into his basket. “You got Indian in your family?”

“Tuh!” she cackled. “Don’t all niggas?”

Another chuckle spilled from his lips. This moment was probably the most amused he’d been with a human in a while. He probably shouldn’t have felt so comfortable speaking with her like this in the middle of a grocery store, but those defiant eyes of hers had this strange sort of spark in them. It was a weird twinkle that made him step away from the shelves and closer to her.

“Ajita,” he began. Her brows jumped expectantly, so he continued. “Invincible. A warrior. Unconquerable. A champ—” 

He stopped himself and blinked in confusion.

“A champion,” he completed.

_A champion?_

Was this the ancestors’ poor attempt at a prank?

“Is that what my name means?” she asked.

Erik met her eyes. She looked shocked and honestly, he would have been lying if he said that he didn’t feel the same. So he simply nodded. 

Ajita stopped to think. She shifted her weight onto a leg and cradled the bouquet on a hip. “Do you think it fits me, pretty boy?”

This woman’s blatant disrespect actually had him fighting the urge to laugh. She’d gotten comfortable enough to call him by such a name after chewing him out for simply looking at her. Had Sekhmet been there, Ajita would have been tortured before finally being granted death. And yet—

 “I’d have to get to know you better to know for sure.”

The words that left his mouth shocked him. He hadn’t meant to say that, not out loud anyway, but something about this woman—about this champion—had him willing to step out of his comfort zone. Or at least try.

She looked away with a scoff, but there was a smile on her face. It was small and barely perceptible, and he honestly wouldn’t have seen it if he hadn’t been watching her so closely, but it was there. She shook her head. “Cornball ass nigga.”

Ajita met his eyes and her smile grew. The sight made his stomach turn. A _human_ making him blurt things and making his stomach turn. Was he finally going soft after a millennia on this planet?

“What’s your name mean?” she asked.

“Honorable king.”

“You a dictionary, huh?”

This time he actually did laugh. He held the basket’s handle tighter, as if he needed something to keep him grounded. And it was fucking with him. “I spend a lot of my spare time readin’.”

“Clearly.”

There was an almost delighted look on her face as she raised her chin to regard him, almost like she was sizing him up. He was actually nervous this time. Nervous with a _human_. Nervous _because_ of a human. 

Erik swallowed and took another step toward her.

Ajita simply stood her ground and watched him.

“You trouble,” he declared. “Ain’t you?”

“You’d have to get to know me better to know for sure,” she responded without missing a beat.

A slow smile slid onto his face.

Erik didn’t mind trouble.


	3. part two.

_part two._

* * *

 The brain is the most powerful organ within the human body—and it stands (well, floats) at a mere three pounds. Flesh blood is constantly and consistently pumped into the brain through a supply line of arteries, nourishing it with each heartbeat. A wrinkly surface covers and encapsulates the brain, aiding it with the interpretation of sensations, the generation of thoughts and ideas, the creation and storage of memories, and the control of voluntary movements. Ultimately, the brain is also made up of three main and very important parts: the cerebrum, the cerebellum, and the brain stem. Buried deep, deep, deep within the cerebrum is one very crucial thing— _the limbic system_.

Although it is extremely tiny, the limbic system is placed in complete and total control of the basic emotions, e.g., fear, happiness, and anger. At the same time, it’s the main force that stands behind the drive that pushes hunger, sex, and dominance. The limbic system’s primary domain is emotion. In other words: _human shit_. The very same human shit Erik made sure to steer clear from. Dealing with these things wasn’t his forte, something he had never been too proud to admit, and because of this it had always been easier to simply refer directly to the source of those fucking emotions rather than dealing with them head-on.

The brain—the cerebrum— _the limbic system_.

It made sense to link gut feelings to both the system and the emotions that it controlled. Although, many would (and could rightly) argue that this was wrong. It was only a _gut_ feeling, after all, and that had nothing to do with the brain or the head area in general. It had _everything_ to do with instinct and senses, however, and mostly everyone could agree that a feeling like suspicion could very easily fall within the categories of both instinct and emotion.

Suspicion (n.) - a feeling or thought that something is possible, likely, or true.

— _synonyms_ ; doubt, cynicism, distrust, funny feeling, mistrust, fear, apprehensiveness, foreboding, worry.

Very rarely was it ever a good thing for anyone to dwell on an emotion like suspicion. In fact, suspicion was more of a rather dangerous thing than it was ever a good thing, especially when a human was involved. The thought alone had Erik contemplating just how much damage would be done to his brain if he were to just snatch his very own fucking limbic system right out of his head, and it was all _her_ fault—that cute and endearing ass fucking bitch—whether she truly was aware of it all or not. And it wasn’t fair or right. Not at all.

It was pretty imperative to specify the fact that Erik wasn’t ready to rid himself of his limbic system simply because he was suspicious of Ajita. He was ready to tear that human shit out of his head because he had 3537 college degrees signed to his name, all of which he’d collected out of sheer boredom during his time on earth. He assumed that he’d collected 3537 degrees anyway, because he’d honestly stopped keeping count after receiving his 2987th.

All of the knowledge he’d soaked up from years of schooling added onto his 1000 years of life experience on this shitty human infested planet only worked to prove one thing:

 _Erik knew his shit_. And so did his gut.

And Ajita was trouble.

Trouble was something Erik made an effort to keep himself out of since his expulsion from the ancestral plane. He was careful not to draw too much attention to himself whenever he stepped out of his apartment, careful to keep himself from getting attached to people and to his surroundings, and careful not to leave any traces of his presence after leaving the environment he’d found himself in before leaving to settle into another. But that woman— _Ajita_ —made it hard to be careful, and she made it even harder for him to stick to his foolproof cycle of adaptation.

Adaptation is defined as a change or the process of change by which an organism or species becomes better suited to its environment. It’s arguably the crux of civilization—the core. Despite how annoying and detestable the humans were, Erik couldn’t deny how admirable their will to live was. How else are humans able to survive such volatile and unpredictable weather with each changing season? How else is it possible for humans to fly in airplanes or drive through tunnels and not have their heads combust due to the popping of their eardrums? How else are humans constantly able to discover new cultures, infiltrate foreign societies, and learn different languages?

Ah-dap- _tay_ -shon.

Learning how to adapt had never been difficult for Erik. It was a lifestyle which had been forced upon him from the very moment he’d stepped foot onto earth. It was a necessity. He was the former champion of the great and powerful Sekhmet, the destroyer, her most beloved creation and her cherished one. He’d been stripped of his titles and more than half the strength of his powers, and was cursed to roam the earth for five millennia—he had no choice _but_ to learn how to adapt. And after only one month of hanging out with Ajita, that human had singlehandedly fucked with his beloved cycle of adaptation.

Erik found himself doing stupid shit.

_Human. Shit._

Stupid human shit like going to the movies, strolling through the mall, and hanging out with her and her friends on the weekends. He even found himself allowing her to tighten up his locks for him and helping her choose a new nail color whenever she was getting ready to go to the shop. His stupid ass was fucking indulging in all that stupid human shit and _enjoying_ it, like the fucking  _dumb ass_ he was—all because he liked to be around her.

Spending so much time with her like this, it forced Erik to realize that she was even more annoying than he had originally assumed. Except this wasn’t an agitating or irritating annoyance. This was an endearing sort of annoyance instead, an almost _cute_ sort of annoyance. It made him want to tease and bother her for hours on end like an immature teenager—and he did exactly that—just so she would show him that blazing fire in her eyes, before she retaliated and enticed him into a stupid argument.

 _Champion_ soon became a term of endearment, from him to her. The first time he called her that had been a mistake, a slip of the tongue he hadn’t even noticed until one of her friends pointed it out to him while Ajita was distracted, saying that it was _cute_. Such a title was one that was to be revered and respected throughout the ancestral plane. It didn’t matter if the title was spoken through the lips of gods and goddesses, demigods and demigoddesses, ancestors, or even another champion. The title _champion_ wasn’t one to be taken lightly and it definitely wasn’t _cute_.

So Erik watched his mouth around her, careful not to speak that word again. It only took about a week and a half before it slipped out again in the middle of a conversation. Her face lit up, she smiled, and that double _c_ hin appeared. His dumb ass decided right then and there that it was _kinda_ cute. He was sure that his usage of this honored title as a nickname bordered on blasphemy, because even the most high respected the title and all that came with it. Yet despite knowing this and despite being a former champion himself, he couldn’t deny how right it felt to call her this.

 _Champion_.

Ajita could be a champion. Couldn’t she? She could be _his_ champion.

The levels of comfort which flourished between the two of them and the friendship that developed surprisingly came a bit too quickly for his liking. It strengthened quite steadily with each passing day and moment that they spent together—and this was simply because this woman _drew_ Erik to her. The way that she soaked his energy up and merged it with her own magnetic aura, she was like a sponge, pulling him to her and ensuring that he would never even think of allowing anyone else to consume any of his free time or thoughts. 

This was also dangerous. 

Once again, Erik had approximately 3537 degrees. He knew his shit, he knew that Ajita was trouble, and he knew that allowing himself to be so comfortable with her was dangerous. So, he tried to be careful with her— _tried,_ being the operative word. He had been sent to earth as punishment, not to become enamored with a human who possessed a mouth that was far too sharp for her own good. Allowing this relationship to continue would only bring consequences, but neither of them could help how endearing she was.

Strangely enough, none of this changed any of his interactions with Ajita. It simply made him want to be around her even more. Even if that meant forgoing his headscarf whenever it was time for bed because he wanted to have her clean his dreads up sooner than they’d scheduled, or sharing his food with her whenever they went out to eat because he wanted to make their conversations run longer and because he liked to watch her eat, or simply teasing her into an absolutely enthralling and playful banter because he loved to see the way her double chin appeared right before she playfully smacked his arm with a laugh. _It was fucking pathetic_ , yet with each sunrise, a new idea on how to trick her into allowing him to remain in her presence for just a second longer blossomed in his mind. All this woman had to do was say one word or just look at him, and she would have his full attention. All of this attention and time and energy, every bit of it that she was unwittingly requesting of him, he placed it all into her hands. Always and readily. He was happy and content to give this all away to her.

 _Her_. Her, and only her.

It took about one more month for Erik to finally realize what this all meant:

 _She had him_.

At this point, Erik felt forced to confront the shift within their relationship, a shift that he hadn’t even noticed until he was struck by the severity of it all—and it was there. Their dynamic, if one could even call it that, had changed. This wasn’t a dramatic change, but a very faint and almost indiscernible one that managed to be absolutely discernible at the same time.

Erik felt it. And he liked her.

No. Or was it, _yes_?

Perhaps the word _like_ was too much, or maybe even too little. He honestly wasn’t too sure of the specifics just yet, but he was both painfully and acutely aware of certain things. He knew that he wasn’t yet willing to admit that deep down he wanted more from this human, and that he secretly wished to be more than just her friend. He knew that his feelings for her took the sweetness out of that measly word _crush_  and left it as a dark burning sensation that created a strange concoction, one that he wanted to pour onto his skin and have her lick off. He knew that he shouldn’t have allowed himself to grow so comfortable with her, or allowed her to steal him away with her loud laugh and hard words—because whether she knew it or not, she had him.

It was such a strange thing for him to take into account. He had already suspected what it all was, but he was incredibly reluctant to accept it. _She was a human_. But at the same time, it wasn’t very hard for him to admit to himself that the current situation had certain wisps of inevitably swirling all around it. They had _chemistry_ —the two of them clicked, and she constantly drew him to her. It became increasingly difficult to support this denial of his the more time they spent together. He simply couldn’t help how _comfortable_ he was with her, and it was through this growing comfort that he would grow with her and _because_ of her, and it was so hard for him to deny anything or any of it because _it was her_. This woman was all encompassing, and he was all too glad to allow her to swallow him up, just so he could be lost in her world; lost in her.

_But Ajita had him, she absolutely did._

And on their third month together, they kissed.

_____

Erik wasn’t a big fan of celebrations. He was the former champion of one of the most powerful deities, he’d been stripped of more than half of his powers and forced to live amongst the humans for five millennia, the entire ancestral plane had turned their back on him, and he caught feelings for a human. _What did he have to celebrate and be happy about?_ was what he normally would have asked. But today was different.

Today, the first day of spring, marked his one millennia anniversary earth.

One down. Four more to go.

He chose to honor the occasion by paying a visit to a local park he’d grown fond of during his time in Harlem. It was tiny and nameless and kind of ugly, but for some reason it reminded him of home—of the ancestral plane—from the moment he first walked past it four years ago. While the moon did supply a good amount of light wherever the trees decided to let it show, the crisp and chill of the air managed to take away from the light glow from above. This would have bothered him had it been a different day.

The acute sound of an owl’s hooting rang through the tiny park. Ajita jumped beside him, reaching for the back of his hoodie and clenching her fingers around the thick fabric as she stepped closer to him.

“Why couldn’t we just come here in the morning? That would have been safer.“

_Hoot!_

“And a lot less creepy.”

Erik pursed his lips to keep the smile from spreading. He looked at her, only to find her looking all about with suspicion. “You good, champ?”

“You never told me why we had to come here,” she declared instead. She took another step closer to him, forcing him to ignore just how good it felt to have her so close. She finally met his eyes. “It’s dark and cold. We’re in the hood, nigga.”

“You think I’ma let anybody fuck with you while I’m here?”

“How many times do I need to remind you of how pretty you are?“

“ _Ajita_ —“

“I mean, what am I supposed to do if you catch the eye of some pimp who happens to be taking his nightly stroll—“

Erik sucked his teeth and looked away as she simply laughed. The moment she rested her forehead onto his arm with a light giggle, a reluctant chuckle of his own slipped past his lips. If anyone had told him that he would actually be taking the time to celebrate anything at all, he would have called them crazy. Yet there he was, shocked that he had someone to celebrate with in the first place. He was even more shocked that he _wanted_ to celebrate with someone.

_A human._

But this human was _her_ and _because_ it was her, everything was absolutely fine.

Ajita shook her head with a soft sigh, gently rubbing her forehead against the fabric covering his arm. “What are we doing here, Erik?”

The bashfulness laced within her words wasn’t normal for her. She was usually brash, frank, and completely unapologetic, and knowing that she didn’t wish to overstep any boundaries made him hesitate to answer. He had been hanging out with her for three straight months, nonstop, and he finally realized just what he kept from her: everything.

Erik slid a hand into the pocket of his hoodie to touch the blades of grass hidden there. Those tiny blades, the very same ones he had held onto for dear life as he was being cast out, were all he had left of his home. As such, they were the perfect celebratory entities. He took a blade between his fingers. “Ajita—“

A decidedly monstrous howl rang through the park, echoing and bouncing off of the dark crevices and hollows that hid within the land. Ajita immediately released her grip on his hoodie to wrap her arm around his and hug him close. He would have laughed had she not been human, but she was just that—only human. She didn’t know what he knew and she hadn’t seen the things he’d seen; she probably wouldn’t live long enough to do either. For this, he felt the need to console her.

“Relax, champ.” His voice was low and soft, the way he knew she liked hearing him talk to her. He finally looked to her and found her looking right back up at him. The corners of his mouth began to curve into a soft smile before he could stop it. “You know I wouldn’t bring you out here if I didn’t think you’d be safe. I gotchu. Aight?”

Ajita rolled her tongue around her mouth before releasing a short scoff, but she nodded. “Aight.”

Erik returned the nod as his eyes scanned her round face. “Today is the anniversary of my arrival to America.”

Regret immediately flooded his system and coursed through his veins. He hadn’t meant to tell her that, but those eyes had him willing to wait on her every beck and call. Before he could take it back with a stupid lie, her eyes widened with wonder as a little smile slid onto her face.

“Yeah?” she asked, her brows raising.

All he could do was agree with a nod and fight a smile of his own as he watched her. It was nice to see her like this, so relaxed and so open and so at ease. It was even nicer to know that drawing such a reaction out of her was all of his doing. It was enough to make him forget all about regret.

“I’ve never had anybody to celebrate with,” he continued. “That’s why I brought you.”

Her smile faltered—just a bit—before it returned. The curving of her lips was much softer this time, much gentler, almost like the physical embodiment of tender sympathy. It touched him, and he could feel it. She hugged his arm closer. “Thanks for bringing me.”

Erik nodded once again, simply because he wasn’t sure if he could trust his voice yet. A former champion being struck silent by some human? No matter how cute she was, _it was fucking pathetic_ , because it was in this moment that it finally hit him. The only reason he had brought her here and shown her such an intimate place was because he was completely enamored of her. It was with this sudden realization that those eyes of hers had him teetering on the brink of inebriation.

Wine. The purest and most refined.

This woman— _this woman_ —she absolutely had him.

He inhaled slowly through his nostrils before clearing his throat. “You welcome.”

“We came here to celebrate,” Ajita declared. She looked away from him to survey the park. “How were you planning to do that?”

The single blade between Erik’s fingers shifted at her words, reminding him of its presence. He pulled it out of his pocket and held it out for them both to watch. “This is the only thing I got left from back home.”

“Home?” she echoed.

“Africa.”

“We’re all from Africa.”

“Africa, near the desert.”

“ _Nigga_!”

They both laughed. She didn’t badger him for answers, and for this he was appreciative. A decidedly pregnant pause settled itself between the two as they watched each other in silence. Her eyes were almost invasive, a far cry from the early summer mornings they usually reminded him of. Those eyes were a fall evening tonight, in which the air had grown chilly right after the moon settled itself into the sky and the world had fallen asleep.

A chill ran down Erik’s spine. It was then that he finally noticed just how warm he felt underneath her stare. He hoped she felt it, too. He clenched his teeth. “This park reminds me of home, so I’m gonna plant it here. Might as well make livin’ in Harlem official, y’know?”

Ajita chuckled. “I didn’t think you’d be the sentimental type, pretty boy.”

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me.”

“Guess whose fault that is.”

Erik bit into his bottom lip. He walked right into that one, all because he just couldn’t _shut the fuck up_ around her. It wasn’t fair to her that he kept most of himself hidden from her while she readily shared all of herself with him. They both knew it. He just hated the fact that he actually cared. 

He shook his head. “Where should I plant this shit?”

Ajita released another sigh. A sharper one. She let his arm go, much to his displeasure, and pointed to a spot. “There. It’s pretty bare and looks like it could do with some extra love.”

Erik nodded and stepped to the spot she pointed to. He crouched to sit on his haunches, stuck his pinky into the ground to create a little hole, and slid the tiny blade of grass in. With a wave of his pinky, the hole closed up. He immediately felt the earth beneath him come to life from that little bit of spark that came from the tiny blade. As little as it was, he knew that this one blade of grass from the ancestral plane was enough to keep the entire area flourishing beautifully regardless of the season.

 _One millennia down. Four more to go_.

At that, he wiped his pinky onto his knee and stood to make his way back to Ajita. She instantly wrapped her arm around his, hugging him close like before. This simple gesture made him glad, simply because it meant that she wasn’t too mad at him. So he met her eyes with no shame and no guilt.

“When did you come to America?” she asked.

“Years ago.”

“The ever mysterious pretty boy of Harlem strikes yet again.”

This made him chuckle as she watched him closely with a little smirk. The beating of his heart suddenly hastened, violently ramming against his chest. He felt even warmer— _hot_. 

What was this? What was happening?

“Okay, better question: when did you come to New York?”

“Four years ago.”

Ajita’s mouth fell open. 

Erik scoffed. “Don’t start—”

“Nigga, did you actually answer a question?”

“Thought I told you not to start—”

“ _Without_ being a smart ass?”

“You the _last_ one who can talk to me about bein’ a smart ass and you know it—”

Ajita took his face into a hand and pulled him down for a kiss. It was soft, chaste, and barely constituted as a peck. Yet it was enough to let him know that her lips were even softer than he imagined they would be, much more delicate. It was enough to let him know that the taste of her was one he wouldn’t easily forget. It was definitely enough to have him grabbing her by the hip to pull her closer. 

She pulled away first, much too early and too quickly for his liking. Those eyes, the very ones that threatened to intoxicate him were dark and heady with an emotion that he had previously been too proud to admit that he’d only ever hoped that she would direct at him. Seeing her like this? It was beautiful.

“You were taking too long,” she spoke after a moment of silence. Her voice was low and quiet, an almost indiscernible whisper. It had him nodding because she was right. “I kissed you. So now, it’s your turn.”

“You tryna tell me what to do?”

“Nigga, _somebody_ needed to—”

Erik took her bottom lip between his teeth, his stomach churning with pride as her words died into a little squeak. Quite frankly, he wanted to shut her up. He could no longer bear to have her be the one in control any longer. He was sick of being the nervous one between the two of them, simply because he had never been the nervous one in any situation and refused to take such a title as his own.

So he kissed her.

A _real_ kiss.

He kissed her long and slow— _very, very slow_ —and carefully, with the gentlest sucks to her tongue and the softest nibbles to her bottom lip as he swallowed her choked moans. He wanted to take his time and taste as much of her as he possibly could. He wanted her to feel every one of his tongue’s strokes and each movement of his lips right down to the tips of her toes. He wanted her to feel every single thing she made him feel in that moment, and make a new and unfamiliar heat boil in the pit of her stomach. This kiss was soft and hard. Messy and neat. So perfectly them that he couldn’t find it in himself to care if anyone walked by and saw him kissing this human who had somehow become an integral part of his life.

Ajita grabbed for the front of his hoodie with a stuttered moan. That alone let him know that he’d done his job. The intensity of their kiss dwindled down to a series of light and delicate pecks before pulled away to watch her face. He nudged her nose with his own, simply waiting until her eyes fluttered open. They watched each other in silence, right before she swallowed hard underneath the weight of his stare.

Erik could have sworn he saw tiny flecks of gold reflecting off of her cheeks. He simply dismissed it as quickly as they appeared and disappeared. “You real quiet now, huh, champ?”

“Sh— Shut up.”

“Stutterin’, too.”

She looked away with a scoff, but he didn’t miss that smile on her lips. It had him biting one back. He took her chin into his grasp, forcing her to meet his eyes as he gently wiped her lips with the padding of his thumb. He honestly wasn’t sure why this felt necessary, but he continued to wipe away and relished in the way she watched him do this. This moment was probably the most peaceful he’d felt since coming to this planet. 

“Well?” she asked, her voice soft as she gave his hoodie a light tug.

“Well, what?”

“Aren’t you gonna do that again?”

_This human._

Erik’s smile finally escaped.

Ajita’s grew, right before he kissed it away.


	4. part three.

_part three._

* * *

Rainfall on earth wasn’t too different from rainfall on the ancestral plane. The rain, just like everything else that hailed from the humans’ world, was much weaker and didn’t posses nearly as much strength as the ancestral plane’s version of rain. The lightning didn’t shine as brightly, the thunder didn’t rumble as loudly, and the raindrops fell with much less ferocity—but this didn’t mean that it was any less annoying. Even the earth’s rain drew sharp feelings of jealousy from deep within the depths of Erik’s stomach, just as the ancestral plane’s rain always did, something that pissed him off whenever it decided to make an appearance. This rain still turned the air that surrounded him into a hazy mist, still urged his eyesight to become foggy, and still made everything else feel mellow. Despite the difference in origination, both versions of rain still managed to present themselves as powerful forces of nature.

The rain _still_ had control. And it still pissed Erik off. 

The _rain_ always pissed him off, whether he was caught in it outside or simply listening to it fall from the safety of his apartment. He had gotten so close to matching the strength of the ancestral plane’s rain before being sent away to this stupid planet, and there he was: jealous of the rain, yet again—but of the _earth’s_ rain. The  _humans_ ’ rain. The thought was almost enough to have him brace his hands onto his knees and vomit. He honestly would have done it had his mouth not been preoccupied with a much more important task:

_Laughing_.

And not just any old kind of laughter, but _easy_ laughter. 

The easy kind of laughter that only grew as it slipped past his admittedly reluctant lips while he and Ajita rushed to his apartment building as cold raindrops continued to fall from the sky. Sudden summer rains paired with a thick blanket of fog that hid both the trees and the sky from his eyes normally pulled his full lips into a deep frown, yet tonight he was… _laughing_. Almost like a giddy child; both of them were. While he was accustomed to the strength of the ancestral plane’s thunder and lightning, the earth’s version always made Ajita jump and yelp with surprise, but she only continued to laugh. That cute ass double chin kept poking out to say, _hello!_ , and he was hard-pressed to return the greeting, simply because he’d never felt so childish and so free. Not since his time on the ancestral plane.

Erik almost wanted to stop himself from laughing so hard. The mere fact that it was an _almost_ , rather than being a definite feeling actually fucked with him a lot more than the whole laughing situation did. He was so sure that something was going to go wrong if he didn’t stop indulging in this, and he knew his shit—approximately 3537 college degrees’ worth of shit—but the more he looked at her, the more he laughed. It felt so strange to laugh so much, but… it was  _her_.

_Ajita_.

Erik’s champion.

“Hurry up and open the door, nigga!”

Erik cleared his throat to keep his laughter from growing. But as he glanced at her and the way she used her hands to protect her new braids from the rain, he couldn’t help the stupid smile that stretched across his face. He, the ( _former)_ champion of Sekhmet, the destroyer, had shifted from a war dog into a fucking cornball and it was all that human’s fault. With a shake of his head, he dug into his pocket and pulled his entrance card out. 

“You need to relax,” he began as he wiped his card with the inside of his shirt. When Ajita held a perfectly manicured hand out to shield the card from the rain as he held it before the card slot, he acknowledged this with a thankful nod. He made a mental note to ask the landlord about the rules regarding giving entrance keys to people who lived outside of the building. “I thought you got them braids to protect your hair. Ain’t that what they doin’?”

Ajita grabbed onto his wrist with a scoff and pushed it forward to force the card into the slot. Once that harsh  _buzz!_ filled the air and the door unlocked, she took ahold of the handle, opened the door, and held it open as they waited for the card to be ejected. “I knew that teaching you about hair was gonna be a mistake.”

A little snort escaped him. He took the card from the slot and stepped inside with her before leading them both to the elevator. Pride coursed through his veins and throughout his entire body when she pressed the button for the fourth floor. “I’ma need your troublesome ass to relax, champ.”

Ajita looked to him with a little smile as the elevator’s door closed. She liked that nickname, Erik knew, and he also knew just how much his _cornball fucking ass_ liked to see that smile. She wrapped her arms around one of his and hugged it close, their wet clothing making a soft and squishy noise that forced him to realize just how soaked they both were. It was a little uncomfortable to have his clothes weighing him down and clinging onto his skin with a slight chilliness in mid-July. He was sure that she felt the same, but as he continued to watch her, he found that he was perfectly fine with it all as long as she was.

“You know you stayin’ with me tonight, right?” he began, his voice low and strangely careful. This was the first time he’d asked her to stay the night with him. That arch in her brow was barely noticeable, a tiny shift that he honestly wouldn’t have even recognized if he hadn’t been watching her so closely. He would have chuckled, or at least smirked, if the air in the elevator hadn’t been so thick. Instead, he swallowed. “I can’t let you leave and get caught up in that rain.”

Ajita hugged his arm closer with a nod. “Okay.”

This human was the very last person he would ever allow to walk headfirst into danger. Her soft-spoken and almost whispered response made him sure that they both knew this fact, because after four more months of being around each other, the growth of his protection over her certainly was a fact and nothing less. She was pretty soft with him despite that smart mouth of hers, and it kind of fucked with him. He was always forced to return the softness, because— _fuck_ —he couldn’t be mean to her. Not to Ajita. _It was her._  She had him wrapped around each and every single one of her chubby fingers. He was big enough and man enough to admit this to himself.

Erik returned the nod. He took her chin between his fingers and ducked to place a kiss onto her forehead, without hesitation. It was a bit soft but definitely lingering, and it made every nerve ending within his body tighten up with discomfort. He shouldn’t have been indulging in such frivolous things. Kissing a human woman on the forehead, letting this human woman hug him close, and inviting this human woman to spend the night with him? Without the intention of having sex? It shouldn’t have been or felt so easy for him to be this way with _any_ human, much less this one. Yet when he released his grip on her chin to gauge her reaction, that bashful smile on her face drew a soft chuckle from him.

Ajita rolled her eyes and burrowed her face into his arm. “Cornball ass nigga.”

Erik bit back a smile and they continued their ride in silence.

When the elevator stopped and the pair made their way into his apartment, they both kicked their shoes off. He followed her into the kitchen, crossing his arms and bracing his elbows onto the counter, watching as she rummaged through his refrigerator for a water bottle. The corners of his mouth curved up at the sight. Sekhmet would have snapped her fingers and had this human burned alive for having the audacity to be so comfortable in both his and her company. But Erik?

He found it kind of cute.

_Cute_.

Before a disgusted scoff could slip past his lips, Ajita looked down at her clothes with a frown and touched her braids. “Thank goodness I got these braids. It woulda been a problem to detangle my hair after getting stuck in that rain.”

He opened his mouth.

She held a hand up. “Don’t say anything.”

“I didn’t.”

“You were _about_ to.”

“What was I _about_ to say, champ?”

Her words died into a little squeak. That little nickname got to her, just like it always did, and they both knew it. So she simply released an annoyed and almost bratty huff that made him snort. “Listen, you pretty nigga—”

Erik sucked his teeth, rolling his eyes at the sound of her short laugh. “What did I tell you about callin’ me that?”

“I don’t remember,” she began as she twisted the cap off of her water bottle. “But I think I told you that you can’t tell me what to do if you’re not my father.”

“ _Tch_. I could be your father if you wanted me to.”

The words spilled from his lips before he had a chance to catch them. As Ajita’s mouth fell open, just a bit, Erik could feel his entire face warming up with a feeling akin to embarrassment. He was immediately bothered by this. What reason did _he_ have to feel embarrassed by anything he said to a _human_? She was just that and _only_ that: a human. It hit him right then and there that this human was the last human he would ever want to put in an uncomfortable position, especially if he could help it. He was keeping her in his home and protecting her from the earth’s weak ass version of  _rain_ , for goodness’ sake.

Ajita looked away, but he didn’t miss the little smile that brightened her face. “Cornball ass nigga.”

Relief coursed through his veins as he continued to watch her, grateful that he hadn’t scared or pushed her away.

“I’m cold,” she continued. She stopped to take a generous gulp from the water bottle in her hand and twisted the cap back onto it with a soft sigh. She hesitated, pursing her lips before meeting his eyes. “I just need to shower before I get sick.”

It took everything within Erik to keep himself from looking her body up and down. He was ultimately forced to raise his chin, both to show her the proper respect she deserved and to keep his eyes under control. He pushed himself off of the counter to show her where the bathroom was. She’d visited his apartment more times than he was willing to admit; she knew where everything was, including the bathroom. There was no need for him to show her where anything was, but she let him, so he did.

Erik made his way to his bedroom the second she closed the door behind herself. He paced back and forth, forcing his brain to _just fucking relax_ as it constantly reworked and rerouted itself to think about the fact that she was just down the hall, completely naked. All he had to do was step out of his bedroom, walk down the short hallway, open the door, and he would be able to see for himself— 

_No_.

This wasn’t some random bitch.

This was _Ajita_.

He shook his head and raised a hand to tug at his dreads, the same ones she had taken her time to tighten up and retwist in the living room just last week. What was wrong with him? She was Ajita, but Ajita was still just a human.

…Wasn’t she?

He quickly changed out of his wet clothing and into something dry, grabbed a book from his bookshelf, and sat in his bed as he attempted to read. This did nothing to distract him from the faint sounds of the shower. His eyes could barely even take a sentence in as most of his efforts went toward restraining himself from imagining what those drops of water looked like rolling off of her body. It was wrong and dishonorable, even if she was his girlfriend.

Erik stopped.

Was she his girlfriend? Were they even dating? For as long as he’d been on this planet, he could honestly say that he wasn’t too sure what was going on between them, simply because he’d never seen the point in pursuing or maintaining such relationships. The very notion and idea of _that_ had never really been something he felt comfortable with. Just the thought of it made him feel uneasy. This was a subject that he had never even desired to sit down and think about in his spare time, much less actually pursue, both of which he had been cursed with the time and opportunity of actually doing about 2.5 million times over.

There were times when someone particularly attractive managed to capture his attention, of course. Recently, a full figure and dark skin that looked like it had been dug up from the purest and untainted soil on earth seemed to be his favorite combination. This was a new weakness that he could admit clashed with his heritage in a way that was almost embarrassingly violent. This soft spot of his had a tendency to whisper an enticing little,  _what if?,_ into his ears whenever that full figure and that dark skin caught his attention, but it would only last for a moment. A very _short_ moment. Never long enough for him to garner enough interest to even consider… doing _that_.

Things were a bit different now. About four months of a difference.

The thought of dating didn’t bother Erik too much now, simply and _only_ because if he actually went through with it, he would be going through it all with her. He knew what Ajita wanted from him and he wasn’t too proud to admit that he might have wanted the same from her. He knew that it was selfish, but he couldn’t realistically allow either of them to have it. She was who she was, and he was who he was—a relationship between a human and a former champion who never aged wasn’t even plausible. This was such a pragmatic way to look at the concept of dating, but he really couldn’t help it. He _needed_ to to be pragmatic about it. He had to be. If there was anything for him to be pragmatic and realistic and logical about, it was this. He needed to find a way to make sense about this shit and lay it all out in his brain in an organized fashion, because he was pretty sure that he was falling for a human.

…Fuck.

_Fuck._

Is this what all this weird shit was? Falling? He was _falling_ for her?

There were constant feelings of softness and sweetness and actual fucking goodness swirling within the pit of his stomach, every single thing his former supreme had warned him against, especially when it came to the humans. Yet it was a human woman who showed him the complete opposite—and he was comfortable with this; completely at ease. The capability to be comfortable was incredibly important to Erik. It went hand in hand with adaptation, after all. The fact that he had become comfortable enough to even consider possibly dating anyone at all was groundbreaking in his opinion, especially and specifically because this _anyone_ was a human.

_A human._

It hadn’t even been difficult for him to even genuinely like her. She was a hot-headed Harlem native with a smart ass mouth, and the only reason they were where they were was because he couldn’t stand the thought of being one upped by a human. Had it not been for that moment in the grocery store, he knew that things would be different; neither of them were each other’s usual type, a fact that they were both aware of. The possibility of dating this very same human made him uneasy, not only because of the prompting of their relationship, but because he couldn’t help thinking that something would go wrong. Something always seemed to go wrong when it came to things like this, but as of now, things were actually… _okay_.

Erik was adapting perfectly fine to this new change. He was completely okay with being _okay_. It was fucked up, but he couldn’t help but wonder when this honeymoon stage would end and when all of these sickeningly sweet feelings would fade away. All of his comfort regarding this normally disconcerting subject had to give way for some sense of normalcy, normalcy being the strange and uncomfortable feelings that usually plagued him when it came to this shit _._

But until this infamous honeymoon stage faded away—

_“Hopefully_ _never!”_ a voice that sounded suspiciously similar to Bast’s pleaded almost desperately.

—perhaps it would be _okay_ for him to give in.

“Erik?”

Erik’s neck snapped up to look toward the sound of Ajita’s voice. She peeked her head through the entrance of his bedroom before she finally stepped in, dressed in just a towel. Her dark skin glistened like she’d been out in the sun all day and he could smell the Shea butter that sat on his bathroom counter emanating from her body all the way from his bed. He wasn’t sure why he did it, but he stood and the book in his hand slipped from his fingers and fell with a light _thud_.

A decidedly pregnant pause filled the air as they watched each other in silence before he approached her. His footsteps were a bit unsure yet undeniably steady. He could feel the ancestors attempting to hold him back and keep him away from her. This was the strongest he’d felt their presence in years, and he was sure that it was because they finally realized what he had known from the very beginning:

This woman was trouble.

But he continued to walk undeterred, pushing forth to get to her. Silence continued to reign in his bedroom as the collective voices of the ancestors’ murmurs filled his ears. They were telling him to stop and to turn away from this as he stood before her—to turn away from _her_.

_“This has gone too far!”_ Sekhmet roared, her sharp voice piercing through the murmurs.  _“N’Jadaka, I command you to stop at once!”_

Erik ignored it all. He could feel little bits and wisps of his powers seeping out of every inch of his body as she watched him with shifting and curious brows. He swore that he saw tiny flecks of gold reflecting off of the curve of her nose and the swell of her cheek. They all vanished just as quickly as they appeared, so he simply dismissed it as a trick of the night when she looked down at the towel wrapped around her body.

“I… I don’t have anything to wear, Erik.”

Ajita’s voice was soft. _Quiet_. It calmed him like nothing else.

Erik swallowed a groan down as he looked to that godforsaken towel. He wanted to rip it off of her and see everything. All of her and every bit of her. He took her by the chin and directed her to look at him. The voices instantly stopped, along with the leakage of his powers. He pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it beside his feet, his entire chest swelling with pride at how deeply she swallowed.

“Better?” he asked, his voice as low as a murmur.

She nodded. “Better.”

Their lips met in a slow and heated kiss as he drew her close with a hand at her hip, the perfect complement to just how badly he wanted to keep himself from scaring her away with everything he felt at the moment. There was nothing safe about this kiss. This one did absolutely nothing to soothe or relax either of them, nothing even remotely teasing about it. This kiss was an immediate plunge into a fiery furnace of pleasure, one that had his flesh burning and his chest practically imploding with every single thing she was pouring into him and drawing out of him, both at the same time. This kiss was all lips and tongue, all moaning and groaning into each other’s mouths, and all heavy breathing and _please make me feel good_. This kiss was getting him _hot_ , so hot and so bothered, as it agitated and scratched at every single one of his carnal senses. All he could hear in his bedroom was the sound of their paired heavy breathing, along with the wet sound of his lips smacking with hers as raindrops continued to assault his window. It was almost overwhelming, but it felt so good and entirely _them_ at the same time.

Erik placed one last kiss onto her lips before pulling away to bring the onslaught of his kisses to her vulnerable neck, drawing a sharp and quiet hiss of his name from her lips as her hands moved to grip his arms. It made him wish that he still had his scars. He briefly wondered if she would like them as he buried his face into her neck with a groan he couldn’t hold back; she felt so good. There were quick little pecks that he would leave, while some kisses were open-mouthed tongue kisses that he would place right on top of her nerves. He left nips on her neck, some gentle and absolutely sweet, while others were rough enough to leave a mark, areas that he would slowly pass his warm tongue over.

The attentiveness that he was showing to her was a kind that he had never bothered to show or share with anyone else. All of this attentiveness of his had her mouth falling open, allowing a beautiful symphony of desperate and shuddering gasps to slip past her lips as she grabbed for his dreads. It seemed to be almost too much for her senses to handle, and he took great pride in this. It all encouraged him, urged him to hold her closer and make sure that he got his mouth onto every one of those nerve endings he’d learned about during his schooling. He couldn’t stop imagining how good it would feel to be buried deep within her folds—and he just _knew_ that she would feel good.

“You gon’ let me have you?” he spoke into her neck, his voice low and a bit muffled. He hadn’t meant to say that, but he couldn’t find one single fuck to give. He wanted her and he knew that she wanted him. So, he simply continued to kiss her neck as his hand drifted to her ass. “Answer me.”

Ajita tugged at his hair. “Y—Yes.”

That little stutter lit a fire underneath his entire ass, forcing him to realize that this was the first time he had ever been so excited to have sex. He was blessed enough to have fucked actual goddesses, demigoddesses, and ancestors for 1000 years during his time on the ancestral plane, along with another 1000 years of fucking humans on earth, all of whom could never compare to the creatures he encountered on his homeland. Yet this one human woman— _this_ _human_ —she made his dick twitch and harden more than anyone else ever could.

Erik angled her face to his liking, giving himself better access to her skin before he moved to place a trail of kisses underneath her jaw. Each kiss made a smacking noise whenever he pulled away to give her another. A weak croaking sound escaped her, one that made him drag his teeth against her neck as he smacked her ass.

“ _Erik_!” she gasped as her knees buckled.

He held her close before she could slip from his embrace and touch the ground. He would always catch her. He grabbed onto the plentiful meat of her ass, kneading it as if he was making bread. 

“You gon’ let me make you feel good, champion?” A low moan slipped past his lips the second she moved her hips to grind on him. _She felt so fucking good_. She responded with a hitched gasp. “Speak, warrior.”

“Fuck, Erik,” she whispered. She nodded. “ _Yes_.”

Their first time together was nothing like Erik had ever imagined, which was something he wasn’t too proud to admit he thought about many times within the privacy of his bedroom or whenever they were together. It wasn’t patient or slow or even remotely romantic. It was hard and rough and against the wall of his bedroom because they just couldn’t wait any longer and didn’t care enough about propriety. Once he got that towel off of her, he simply pushed her against the wall and picked her up, allowing her to clasp her ankles at his back so that he could take her. From then on, it was harsh and hitching breaths intermingling as they kissed. It was the wet and nasty sounds of skin slapping skin while her back rubbed against the smooth wood.

They didn’t make love, and they didn’t even have sex.

They fucked.

_Hard_.

Erik fucked her in a way that was borderline animalistic, plowing into her with harsh grunts as his fingers dug into the meat of her behind. It was at a pace that had her biting into his shoulder and burying her face into his neck with desperate groans, forcing noises out of her mouth that he was sure neither one of them thought could even come out of her. He stretched her so perfectly, filling her in a way that made sure his name was the only coherent thing she could speak. He made sure to kiss her lips and chew on her neck in a way that left her hot and bothered, and left him burning for more of her as he took all of her. It all pushed her over the edge, forcing her to throw her head back as her low moan filled the room. The sound of her voice like that could only be described as bliss.

_Pure bliss_.

All Erik could do was watch through lidded eyes as Ajita floated her way back down to earth. What he was doing with her— _a human_ —couldn’t be erased, and the shamefulness of this should have been ravaging him and eating him alive. But all he could focus on was how good it felt to hold her so close as her naked body jolted against his own, while his eyes darted from her closed lids, to her teeth biting into her bottom lip, and to her heaving chest. A short moment passed before she finally opened her eyes to meet his with a completely sated and almost shy smile that lit her face up. 

The second he saw that little curving of her lips, his breath caught in his throat. 

_Did she have any idea how enthralling she was?_

He decided right then and there that he couldn’t get enough of those orgasms of hers. One was enough for him to make such a decision. Now, he wanted to take his time and show her exactly what he’d learned during his 1000 years on the ancestral plane, and his 1000 on earth. He wanted to make her tremble and scream, and erase the memory of every man she’d ever met before him from her mind. He wanted to make sure that thoughts of _him and only him_ filled her mind whenever she thought of sex and intimacy.

Erik wanted to be selfish with Ajita.

He wanted to ruin sex for her.

“You my champion,” he began, his voice low and hushed as he looked to her lips. He passed his tongue over his own. He leaned into her space, close enough for the curves of their noses to brush as their breaths mingled. “Right?”

Ajita nodded, the walls of her pussy clenching around him. He felt that shit. She was just as ready as he was. “Yes.”

“Say it.”

She swallowed hard. He didn’t have to meet her eyes to know that they were clouded and hazy. “I’m— I’m your champion.”

“Gimme a kiss, warrior,” he ordered under his breath.

She immediately took his face into her hands and did as he said, kissing him as slowly and as gently as they both needed while he walked them both to his bed.

It was different the second time, patient and more deliberate. These strokes were more controlled and thorough, long and deep and absolutely unhurried strokes that ground into her and had her eyes rolling back as her mouth fell open with helpless gasps. His fingers were everywhere; gently kneading her breasts and rolling her nipples underneath his thumb, caressing her stomach and hips, and smacking her buttocks and thighs with the flat of his palm before squeezing them, urging her to wrap her legs around him tighter—she did, always—before they started their journey all over again. He touched her with a possessiveness that spoke volumes about everything he had been feeling during the past few months, a possessiveness he wished he would have acted on long ago.

Erik’s hair, heavy with sweat, fell in front of his eyes. He was sure that if hers were open, she would see the desire that pooled and swirled in the depths of his own— _all for her, and only her._  This pushed a feral grunt out of him.

“Who got you this wet?” he questioned, his voice gruff and heavy. He kissed her and spoke into her mouth: “Answer me, Ajita, am I the one who got you soakin’ like this?”

Ajita couldn’t answer, unable to tell him anything as she continued to drip onto his sheets. His words had her eyes falling shut as she squirmed and arched her back underneath him, jolting as if she had been struck by lightning. It all had her grabbing for his buttocks in an attempt to pull him in closer and biting his shoulder out of frustration, frustration that he felt because there was no way to fuse the two of them into one. It had her licking and kissing and sucking the bruise she had left and attempting to pull his hair straight out of his scalp with one hand, loc by loc, while clawing and scratching at his back with the other as she desperately choked his name out.

He took it all in stride and with grace, and the vulgarity of the words he spoke to her faded into soft and gentle ones. These were sweet words, dangerous words, the most assuring and most comforting and most beautiful nothings that felt like everything. She was only human, after all. So he told her how good she felt and how good her skin tasted, and how good and how perfect she was. He spoke these words against her lips and whispered them into her neck, and it all made him realize just who and what this human had become to him.

This wasn’t lovemaking, but it was _something_ : tender and deliberate fucking that he felt deep within his chest and core while the headboard of his bed created a beat against the wall. The more he touched her and the more he spoke to her, the harder it was for him to remember the last time he had experienced such desperation and such fervor for another being; for their body and soul. Then he remembered:

Never.

“ _Erik_!”

A slow roll of thunder filled the air as Ajita came, her entire body jolting underneath him. All he could do was watch as he continued to fuck her through her orgasm with a ragged grunt. He’d never been so entranced or thrown off by the sight of a woman’s undoing. Everything about her was so fucking soft, and so fucking wet, and so fucking _human_ that, quite frankly, he just couldn’t get enough of it. He just couldn’t get enough of _her._

“Erik— _Shit_ ,” she gasped. She released her grip on his hair as she shifted underneath him, pushing at his chest with a soft whine. It made him grunt through gritted teeth and fuck her harder. “I— I can’t— You’re gonna make me—”

Erik took her wrists into his hand and trapped them above her head. He kissed her, muffling her stuttered groans and deep gasps before she came again with a scream into his mouth. He readily swallowed it and slowed down for her—again, she was only human. She arched into him with a soft sigh as he allowed himself to just _feel_ her and to bask in all she was offering to him. The way her gushing pussy contracted around his weakening erection; her meaty legs snaking around his waist and pulling him closer; her ample breasts and plush stomach pressing against his hard torso. It felt amazing to have her fleshy body pressed so flush against his own, and he knew that this was something he would never grow tired of.

The pacing of his strokes shifted from simply slow to slow, patient, and careful as he took her bottom lip between his teeth. He gave it a gentle tug and a soft nibble that made her sigh his name before capturing her lips with his own, once again. He kissed her deep and slow, with an uninhibited rawness that he had been unable to show to any other being before her—because he was sure that it had always been her. It would _always_ be her, and this ancient god knew that this would never change. For that, he felt compelled to fuck her just as deep and slow and raw as he was kissing her, and he did just that, swallowing all of her excited little gasps and moans as he did so.

“You fuckin’ crazy,” she slurred into his mouth.

Erik simply moaned against her lips and released his hold on her wrists to lace their fingers. Everything about this was slow. Slow kisses and slow fucking. Deliberate fucking. The only type of fucking he could afford with this woman, because she felt felt a little _too_ good. She was exquisite.

A helpless moan slipped past Ajita’s lips and into his mouth as she arched into him with an almost palpable sort of desperation. She pulled away from his lips and threw her head back. “Erik, you’re gonna make me— I’m gonna cum—”

He placed a lingering kiss onto her cheek and her words immediately died into a shuddering whimper. Impossible as it seemed, he could have sworn he felt her pussy grow even wetter as his lips moved to kiss along her earlobe. “Tell me how you want it. You know I’ll give it to you, champ—”

“ _Fuck_!”

A strained groan rumbled deep in his throat as her body jolted against his and convulsed around him in an orgasm that wracked her nerves. He simply shut his eyes and slowed his strokes down in an attempt to maintain his composure as the walls of her pussy did their best to pull him deeper into her warmth— _into her_ —and _fuck_ , did she feel good. Her ragged breaths touched his sensitive ears as she rolled her hips against him, slow and hard. Despite how difficult she was making it for him to stay in control and concentrate, he couldn’t help the proud smile that slid onto his face. His champion was ready, and it was beautiful.

“Talk to me. Tell me how you want it.”

“Just like— Just like that.”

“Just like this?”

A choked sob slipped past her lips, her nails digging into his hands. “You feel so good— Give me you— Let me cum for you—”

“Answer me, champion.”

“— _please, I need you so bad_ —”

Erik’s smile stretched as she struggled for a coherent answer. She was creaming all around him. He could already feel just how soaked and messy his bed was— _and it felt good_. He knew that they were making a mess but he couldn’t find one fuck to give, because every single fuck he had was being put directly into her. “I need an answer, Aj—”

Ajita’s head fell back as another orgasm coursed through her body and a deep cry of his name escaped her, which counted as more than just a proper answer for him. He placed one last kiss onto her cheek before meeting her eyes. They were screwed shut as her entire body shook, her face absolutely flushed. She was an absolute mess and the sight of her in such a state stretched his smile into a full-blown grin as sharp and wet smacking sounds continued to bounce off of the walls of his bedroom.

“You know how good you feel right now, champ?”

She shook her head before throwing it back. “Oh, my God! _Shit_!”

“You got one more for me?“

“Fuck you, Erik!”

A guttural groan erupted from his throat as he watched her. “I just need one more, champ.”

“You’re crazy! Gonna make me cum aga— Shit, Erik!”

Erik kissed her cheek, then her jaw, then her neck. She mumbled some gibberish, but he swore that he heard his name loud and clear.

“Are you my champion?” he asked into her neck before placing another kiss there, soft and lingering. It made her whimper, a sweet sound that made him smile into her skin. “Hm, Ajita?”

“Sh— _Shit_ , you feel so fucking good.”

He raised his head to meet her eyes, his stomach turning at how hazy they were. “Say it.”

“I’m your— _fuck_ — I’m— I’m your champion.”

A low moan slipped past his lips. She sounded so fucking good like that.

“Erik, baby,” she whispered before he kissed her. “Baby, I’m gonna cum.”

“Good.” He kissed her again. “Now, say it again,”

“I’m your champ— _Shit_ , Erik, you fuckin’ me so good!”

“Are you my fuckin’ champion?” he demanded, his voice low and harsh, the harshest he’d ever been with her.

“Shit! You’re crazy! Fuck you, Erik! Oh my—” A harsh gasp slipped past her lips, interrupting her as she jolted against him. It only made him move a bit faster. She gave a choked moan. “Goddamn!”

Erik swallowed her breathless gasp and released a guttural groan into her mouth. A harsh grunt followed. “You my strong warrior. Invincible and unconquerable. So you can take all this dick, right, baby?”

She opened her mouth to speak, but little snippets of gibberish slipped out instead. It sounded like a prayer. It made him feel like every bit of the god he was.

“Speak and use your words,” he ordered. “Lemme hear you, champion—“

“ _Fuck_!”

Ajita threw her head back with a cry of his name. _Erik, Erik, Erik_ , was all he could hear as he watched her come undone. She choked on his name as she repeated it, moaning and screaming and gasping his name out like it was a mantra. Like she was praising him—because she was _his_ champion and _his_ cherished one. She sounded so beautiful, and it was almost enough to have him tell her to call him by his true name as he fucked her through her orgasm.

_N’Jadaka_.

Just the thought alone made him cum right along with her, with a harsh groan as he collapsed on top of her. The air was hot and sticky as they panted together. It made him feel like he needed to get off of her. He knew that he was heavy, but the comfort he found from just laying on her and resting his flaccid penis inside of her was something he wanted to indulge in for a bit longer. So, he unlaced their fingers and her hands immediately moved to hug him close. He hugged her right back.

Ajita’s eyes were shut as he watched her pant and swallow. The sheer amount of joy he received from _just watching_ her bothered him. He would sit down and watch her all day if she and their schedules permitted it. She was just human, but for some reason, he wanted her to know his given name. His _true_ name. He wanted so badly just to hear her say it.

Erik kissed her to keep himself from spilling his thoughts. She melted into his kiss with a soft moan that made him grunt, her fingers threading themselves into his hair. She gave his dreads a playful tug before pulling away and throwing her head back with a soft moan.

“Fuck, Erik,” she sighed. She hummed a little, a soft smile gracing her full lips as she finally opened her eyes to look at him. This made him swallow. _Hard_. “You’re good at this shit.”

He wanted to joke that he had about 2000 years of practice before stumbling upon her. But he simply allowed the corners of his mouth to curve up a little. “You can get better.”

She scoffed and rolled her eyes, though her smile remained. “Whatever, pretty boy.”

“It’s okay,” he declared with a low chuckle. He placed a soft kiss onto her lips, one that made a short smacking noise when he pulled away. “I can teach you.” He gave her another kiss. “I wanna be the one who teaches you.”

She arched into him when he kissed her again. “That’s pretty entitled.”

“I don’t give a fuck.”

Ajita laughed into his mouth and his heart stopped so suddenly that he couldn’t help taking her bottom lip between his teeth. She gasped, a quiet moan escaping her as he feasted on her flesh with soft nibbles. The flats of her fingertips massaged themselves into his scalp, drawing a light groan of approval from his throat before he claimed both of her lips as his own. He just couldn’t stop doing that— _kissing her_. But she placed a hand onto his chest to keep him from taking it any further.

Erik placed one last kiss onto her cheek before moving to pull out of her. She jerked with a short hiss, one that made him think that he probably should have been a bit easier on her. She was only human, after all, something that he had to constantly remind himself whenever he was with her. She would probably be sore and uncomfortable when she awoke in the morning. This thought prompted him to leave his bedroom and return with a small basin filled with warm water and a washcloth.

The emotion in the air was thick, staticky, and charged with electricity as he sat between her legs. He dipped the washcloth into the basin and pulled it out, wringing the water out before he began to clean her. This moment was the most intimate he’d ever been with anyone in his 2000 years of living. Having her twitch and squirm as he cleaned himself from her and seeing her toes curl up made him work a bit more gently. He almost felt happy to be cast out, which certainly was strange because the ancestral plane was all he dreamt of since being cast out. But _this woman_ —

“Aye, champ,” he spoke before his thoughts could dig any deeper. This was bordering on blasphemy. As annoying as those piece of shit ancestors were, he couldn’t lie and say that he didn’t possess some level of respect for them. “You good?”

“No, nigga, you killed me.” A sharp hiss escaped her as he continued to clean her. “Fuck you and your dick, you hoe. And I _know_ you’re a hoe ‘cuz only a hoe can do the shit you just did to me. I should take my ass home now.”

Erik snorted, a chuckle slipping out. He grabbed her foot and brought it up to his lips to kiss her ankle.

Ajita groaned and shifted a bit. “Don’t start. I swear I’ll fight you if you start.”

He only smiled and placed another kiss onto her ankle before setting her foot down. She sighed.

“You’re fucking crazy, Erik,” she whispered.

As her eyes fluttered shut, he knew that he wouldn’t be dreaming of the ancestral plane tonight. He swallowed and looked to the washcloth in his hand. He quickly used his powers to remove any trace of his semen from her; he didn’t want to risk anything for either of them.

Her light snoring touched his ears. It made him bite into his lip to keep from smiling. Somehow, it sounded just as good as everything else that came from her mouth. He shook his head and clapped a hand over his face with a low groan. What the fuck did this woman do to him? 

Erik looked her over one last time before leaving to toss the washcloth into his laundry hamper. He washed his hands, grabbed a few extra sheets and pillows from the linen closet, made his way back to his bedroom, and created a makeshift bed on the carpeted floor. He took Ajita from the bed, careful not to wake her as he gently laid her onto her pillow before he laid beside her. He took her into his arms, pulling her leg over his hip and grabbing onto her ass with a grip that might have been a bit too possessive for the ancestors’ liking.

After this, he just watched her.

There were little snorts slipping past her lips. The rain hadn’t calmed down one bit, but he found that it was the perfect background music to his little show. He could hear the ancestors murmuring, telling him that sex was enough and that there was no need to watch her as she slept within the cocoon of his arms, that there was no need to even hold her. He honestly wasn’t too sure what to make of their murmuring, but he was positive of one thing: he didn’t care. The sound of his heartbeat seemed to be drowning them out, anyway. For the first time since he had been cast out, it was steady. Calm. At peace. 

He was fine.

Erik placed a lingering kiss onto Ajita’s forehead and waved a finger. With that, the lights were off.


	5. interlude i.

  _interlude i._

* * *

Erik remembered the day of his creation clearly, not that he ever really believed that he would be able to forget. He remembered just how carefully his figure had been molded and sculpted from that fine mixture of the ancestral plane’s purest dirt and the crushed seeds which had been taken from a ripe heart-shaped herb. He even remembered the smell of this concoction: sweet and tart, both at the same time. He remembered the sheer patience which had been threaded within the confines of his creator’s fingertips as they worked to form each scar that decorated his body. He especially remembered Sekhmet’s smile, the very first thing he’d ever seen after opening his brand new eyes to survey his brand new surroundings.

There was a joyous celebration after this. Food and drinks all around, along with sounds of sex and loud music that filled the land. It was all for him and because of him—simply for existing—something the humans would call a birthday party.

As the celebrations winded down, his creator and supreme formally introduced herself to him during a ceremony. Her name was _Sekhmet,_ the destroyer. She made him kneel down before her as everyone watched, onto the same brown soil from which he had been created. She bent over to place a lingering kiss onto his forehead, and he immediately felt a burst of power flow from her lips and into him. It pierced through his fresh skin to course through and within his newly formed veins. 

 _Her blessing_. 

Sekhmet stood. All of the music and every bit of clamoring immediately came to a halt. She placed a hand onto his shoulder and gave it a light grip, her fingers still marred and dirtied from forming him.

“I present to you all,” she spoke to the silent and expectant spectators. “My most beloved creation. My cherished one. My champion.”

The power and authority laced within this declaration made him lurch forward with sharp grunt. He braced his hands onto the ground as he fell forward, his nostrils flaring as his veins shined through his skin with a beautiful purple glow. A strange bubble of energy wafted deep within his stomach, one that was made from the very same power and entity that came from her kiss. If anyone noticed any of this, they didn’t make it known. 

“What shall you name him?” a voice as soft and melodic as a wind chime questioned.

“N’Jadaka.” His supreme answered without doubt and without hesitation. It made him dig his fingers into the soil. “He shall be called, N’Jadaka.”

Cheers erupted all around him and throughout the land, and the bubble in his stomach disappeared. It was replaced by strength and awareness. With just a name to seal his identity, his creation had officially come to completion.

“Look to your supreme, N’Jadaka.”

The sound of his supreme’s voice was soft as she addressed him, almost gentle. He raised his chin to look at her, but it wasn’t Sekhmet. It was Ajita.

_Ajita?_

A soft smile graced her full lips as she watched him blink up at her with confusion. This look that she was giving him was made up of a warmth that contrasted sharply with Sekhmet’s heavy gaze. He found himself silently appreciating it. He might have even liked it much more.

“A—” His throat closed up around his voice, his mouth dry from the soil that had yet to be cleaned from the flat of his tongue. He clenched his teeth and swallowed hard as he prepared himself to speak for the first time. His fingers relaxed from their position within the soil, allowing him to push himself up to stand up tall on his knees. He wanted to give her the respect and attention she deserved. “Ajita?”

Ajita’s smile grew and she held a hand out. “Take my hand, N’Jadaka.”

N’Jadaka hesitated. He looked to the eyes watching their exchange before returning his attention to the woman standing before him. The corners of his lips curved up and into a little smile as he raised a hand, reaching for hers—

Erik sat up in his bed with a sharp gasp as he awoke. His chest rose and fell with heavy pants as he looked around his bedroom, right before his eyes landed on his messy bed. He was still on the floor and in the makeshift bed he’d created just last night— _not_ in the ancestral plane. It was just a dream, just like it had always been since his exile.

The memory of Ajita speaking his true name made him smile a bit. He had been dreaming when she said it, but she still said it. That counted, didn’t it?  _Didn’t_ _it?_ The name, N’Jadaka, came from _her_ voice and spilled from _her_ lips. The sound was as beautiful as a carefully structured symphony which had been crafted especially for royalty, a sound he was sure he would continue to dream of again and again. He wouldn’t soon forget.

Erik looked to the spot beside him, only to find it empty and completely devoid of her form. His fingers twitched, unsure of whether or not he wanted to check to see if her pillow was still warm. This was the first human he’d ever allowed himself to get so close to, the first he’d allowed in so readily. Had he been stupid to place this much trust into the hands of a human? Did she leave? Was she… _gone_?

The ancestor’s murmurs slowly filled his ears. They were doing their absolute best to instill the sharpest feelings of doubt and sadness within him. They were trying to make him angry with the humans—with one specific human, in particular—and it almost worked. All he needed was one more second before he was back to swearing off of the wretched humans and cursing them all, just as he’d been accustomed to doing before meeting _her_. But then she stepped into his bedroom wearing one of his shirts, rendering every murmur completely silent and dispelling each doubt.

Erik could only watch in a stunned silence as she approached him. The shirt was tight on her, just barely covering her ass. Her ample thighs were in full view for him, along with those stretch marks and the dimples that decorated them. The sight made him want her again. It made him _hungry_ for her again as she played with her fingers in front of her stomach. He wanted to pry them apart, lift the shirt, and kiss every inch of her belly before tasting her, something he’d forgotten to do last night because he had been too excited to be buried within her.

“Hey, you’re finally awake.”

The sound of her voice broke him out of his stupor. 

“Yeah.” He blinked up at her, shaking his head as he fought to dismiss as much of his daze away. He ran a hand down his face with a low groan before meeting her eyes. “Thought you left.”

Ajita’s brows jumped with surprise, a little frown tugging her lips down. He wanted to kiss it away. “You thought I left? Did you want me to?”

“No,” he answered a bit too quickly for his liking. He ignored this and reclined onto the wall. “I just… woke up. And you weren’t here.”

It finally hit him, right then and there, just how disappointing the possibility of her being gone was. The relief that filled his belly when he saw her round face… He couldn’t lie and say that it wasn’t refreshing, because it was. It absolutely was. There was a smile on her face, like she knew. It reminded him of the little smirks that used to touch Bast’s lips whenever she won a bet.

“I had to call my job before using the bathroom,” she explained before looking down at herself. She grabbed for the hem of the shirt she wore, tugging it down. It took everything within him to keep himself from telling her to stop and just take the shirt off, altogether. “And I, uh, I needed something to wear. Sorry for just digging through your stuff. My clothes are still wet and I know this doesn’t really fit and I’m stretching it out, but—”

“You look perfect.”

Ajita met his eyes. She looked surprised, maybe embarrassed, before the corners of her mouth curved up. It was such a little curving, but still a curve nonetheless. “Y—Yeah?”

Erik felt a smile of his own growing. “Yeah.”

That little curving of her mouth slowly morphed into one loaded with nervousness. He didn’t want to see anything like that on her face, not after the night he’d just shared with her. He felt the need to let her know that everything was okay—that _she_ was okay—so he held a hand out to her. 

Ajita fell to her knees and crawled onto the makeshift bed. She quickly made her way over to him and claimed her rightful place on his lap, with a leg on either side of him as she straddled him. The shirt rode up and he immediately found himself feeling on her hips, gently kneading his fingers into the plush flesh there, along with the lower section of her stomach. He could already feel himself hardening underneath her, and he was sure that she felt it.

Erik felt like he was being shrouded by a literal and physical cloud of haziness as he watched her. For as long as he had roamed this earth, he had never been so enamored with anything or anyone, much less a human. _A mere mortal_. The only other emotion that could compare was his allegiance to his supreme, but that was still nothing like this. Yet this woman, she had him wrapped around each and every one of her chubby fingers that were currently playing with his dreads.

“Are you a goddess?”

The words left his mouth before he could catch them, a faint whisper slipping past his awestruck lips. A _blurt_. A former champion had no business just  _blurting_  shit to anyone, especially not to a human. He had been the champion of the great and powerful Sekhmet, the destroyer—her cherished one and her most beloved creation. He fought for her _and_ beside her in battle. When he spoke, people listened. When he stepped into a room, people moved out of the way and created a path for him to walk. But this particular human just had him _blurting shit out_. Random shit that she had no business hearing because this human was just that: a human.

 _But was this woman a goddess_? 

Had she been roaming this earth for as long as he’d been before they met? Perhaps she had been on this planet longer than him? Had she been there during its conception? Because he would kill for her, without hesitation and without a single doubt in his mind. He would kill for this woman. He would gladly be her champion and fight for her in any war, with more ferocity and vigor and allegiance than he had ever shown to Sekhmet.

Ajita’s brows knitted a bit as she watched him with slight confusion. She slowly shook her head. Despite the funny look she was giving him, she allowed a little smile to slide onto her face. “Come on, pretty boy, don’t be dumb.”

All he could do was watch her, because he hadn’t meant to say that. Not out loud.

Her fingers stopped playing with his hair. She took a slow breath and swallowed as the realization of his seriousness seemed to wash over her. Her smile, small as it already was, faltered a bit as her hands slid down and over his shoulders to rest on his chest. “You make me nervous sometimes. The way you look at me and the things you say, I mean. It’s a lot to live up to. I’m… I’m not perfect.”

Erik ignored those imaginary flecks of gold dancing on her chin. He shook his head. “You the most perfect thing I’ve ever known, cherished one.”

“Er—  _Erik,_ ” she gasped as her smile finally fell. She swallowed and released a shaky breath, looking away from him. “You can’t— You can’t just say shit like that.”

“Why not?” he asked as his eyes roamed the expanse of her full face. He would just sit there and watch her all fucking day if he could; if she would let him. “Too much?”

“No, nigga. Not— Not too much.” She scoffed and rolled her eyes before a short wince contorted her features. She sucked her teeth. “It’s just that you talk about as pretty as you look. So shut up, okay? Just shut up.”

A low chuckle escaped him, one that made her hesitate to look at him. So he took her by the chin and made her. “You look good in my clothes.”

She hesitated again. “That’s a corny way to say that you wanna take this shirt off of me.”

“Cornball’s translation.”

Ajita laughed an easy laugh. The sound was as rich as the milkiest chocolate as it filled his bedroom, her double chin peaking out to say, _hello_. He was mesmerized by every bit of this show she was inadvertently giving him. All he could do was watch as his deft fingers resumed their exploration of her body, gently massaging the fleshy meat of her upper thighs.

“Fuck, Erik, not there,” she whispered, hissing as she scooted closer to him. She took his hands and directed him to grab onto her bare ass, which he gladly did. He pulled her closer to himself with a low hum of appreciation as she caressed his neck and shoulders. She sighed. “I’m sore. You caught me off-guard last night. I would have at least stretched if I knew.”

Erik laughed. It was so easy to do that with her. “Sounds like a good excuse to get some practice in, champ.”

That nickname drew a little smile onto her face. Gods, that smile. This was a smile that had the potential to make the strongest empires crumble. He was sure of this. It reminded him that he still hadn’t gotten a chance to taste her. He was willing to bet that the relief of gulping down an ice cold glass of water on the hottest day of the summer felt _almost_ as good as she tasted. He just couldn’t wait to coax those delicious juices to flow out of her and into his mouth, onto his tongue and into each and every single one of his taste buds. They had all day today.

The hair fuzzing out of her braids caught his attention. She would be pissed once she noticed, if she didn’t already. It made him think of home. The ancestral plane. Those little curls made him think that despite him calling her, “champion,” she could be his new home. This woman could be his new refuge, his new goddess to fight for and champion for. _He_ could be _her_ champion.

“Oh?” She raised a perfectly arched brow, her smile still intact. “Since I need to get better at fucking, right?”

A smile of his own grew. That was even easier to do with her. 

“Yeah, somethin’ like that,” he admitted, his voice low and quiet. “Gimme a kiss, warrior.”

Ajita took in a breath. It hitched with excitement as she took his face into her hands, leading him into a slow kiss. She grabbed for his hair, tugging at it while he slipped his hand underneath the shirt she wore to caress her stomach. She gave a soft moan. The sound had him gripping as much of her ass as he possibly could with his hand, guiding and directing the movement of her hips as she gently ground herself onto his hardening erection over the thin sheet that covered him.

“Your breath smells, pretty boy.”

“Yet you still kissin’ me.”

She laughed into his mouth, something that made his smile stretch out and into a full-blown grin. For the first time in one thousand years, he felt that everything was okay. And he believed it.

“Come on, champ,” he declared as he grabbed her by the hips and flipped them over, placing her onto her back as he settled himself between her legs. “Lemme take care of you and get rid of that soreness.”

Erik placed one last kiss onto her lips before he kissed his way down to his new destination.

 

 


	6. part four.

_part four._

* * *

Change wasn’t something that Erik was good with.

This was such a strange thing for him to acknowledge and come to terms with when he considered just how professionally he handled the distinct art of adaptation, along with how similar the two concepts were. Adaptation is defined as a change or the process of change by which an organism becomes better suited to its environment. It’s a process, a systematic series of events that one would be able to gradually adjust themselves to as it all happened, at whatever pace fit or pleased them. And change?

Change (n.) - the act or instance of making or becoming different.

Change could happen within an instant. At the snap of a finger and in the blink of an eye. Just like  _that_ , completely under someone’s nose and over their heads ~~—~~ both at the same time and with no warning. There was no room to adjust, adapt, or become comfortable with change. Once again, Erik wasn’t very good with the idea of this  _change_  shit, much less the actual realities of it. He was fucking terrible with it, and this was one thing about himself that he was acutely aware of.

Erik grew suspicious whenever Harlem, a city that was much too prone to trouble for its own good, grew too quiet and peaceful for an allotted amount of time. Despite openly and unabashedly disliking the ancestors, he hated when they refused to speak up and interject whenever he did something stupid. That always meant that something was wrong; that he was acting too human. Recently, he found that he hated whenever something was wrong with Ajita, especially when there was nothing he could do to help other than sit with her in silence. But the moment that he called her his  _cherished one_  was the very same moment that he realized just how badly change could really shake shit up for him.

The title “cherished one” was blessed.  _Sacred_. It was reserved only for the champions that resided within the ancestral plane; lower level gods but still gods all the same. It wasn’t meant or created to be used as a term of endearment, especially not for a human. Erik knew exactly what the title entailed—it used to be his, after all—but he also knew that Ajita was  _his_ champion and  _his_ cherished one. 

Such a thing changed Erik’s relationship with Ajita in an almost imperceptible, yet entirely obvious way. He had suddenly been catapulted onto a new level of comfort and intimacy with this woman, a level that both scared and excited him, while somehow managing to shroud him within a cocoon of warm safety at the same time. He had to admit that it felt a bit ridiculous to acknowledge that the constant usage of two phrases had been the force which drove him to realize just how deep his feelings for her ran, simply because it wasn’t like either of them were wasting their time with one another. Not anymore. He would never want a woman like Ajita to waste her time with him, especially when there were plenty of other suitors who would probably be a much better fit for her; more worthy of her time and presence.

Yet she stuck with him.

_Ajita stuck with him._

It was because of this his growing attachment to her finally became clear to him. This wasn’t something that he was willing to admit (not out loud, anyway), but it also wasn’t something that he could deny in good conscience—and this was simply because everything was going so well. He was  _genuinely happy_ and he was prospering, both with her. This was the best Erik had felt since his time in the ancestral plane and it was for this reason, after one thousand years on earth, this former champion finally allowed himself to fully enjoy the human experience.

The months that followed were primarily made up of Erik slowly opening himself up to being comfortable enough to recline onto his headboard and simply relax whenever Ajita would walk around his bedroom, wearing nothing but a tank top and a pair of panties. He found that he liked to see the light dimples that coated the fleshy and meaty confines of her thick thighs poke out to say,  _hello_ , whenever she bent over or stood on the tips of her toes to observe something more closely. He also liked to watch her whenever she slept beside him as she wore absolutely nothing at all as the light of a sunrise peeked through the blinds of her bedroom’s window and touched the skin of her bare ass  _just_   _so_ , accentuating its plumpness and the lines that decorated it. He could never resist taking her face into a hand, caressing her full cheek with the padding of his thumb as he woke her up with sweet kisses all over her face. She never opened her eyes when she awoke, but she would make him aware of her consciousness with a low whine, joking that no amount of good sex could ever compete with the ass whooping she would give him if he kept this behavior up. He would simply smile and place a final kiss onto her forehead before they both got up to prepare for their day.

Simply  _being_ with Ajita within the comfort of either of their bedrooms was… different. Erik would hold her close as he drew silly designs into the small of her back, his stomach churning with some foreign and unexplainable emotion as she rested her chin onto his chest and gently massaged his beard, completely oblivious to the way he watched her like a lovesick puppy as they spoke. He would sneak kisses into their conversations because of this, whether they were kisses to her forehead in the middle of a sentence or a random kiss to her lips, followed by a playful nibble that worked to make her just as flustered as he was. Sometimes he would even sneak sex into their conversations. Slow and patient sex so that they could continue talking and joking and laughing, and sex so passionate and so good that they were forced to cut the conversation short and resume afterwards feeling hot, sweaty, and sated.

Being able to  _simply_   _be_  with another being in such a way was exhilarating. It almost made Erik wonder how he ever could have thought that just passing through life would be enough.  _Almost_ , because actually thinking such a thing would be blasphemous; his punishment was approved by the most high, after all. But he had  _her_ now, and intimacy soon became a daily longing that he couldn’t ignore—intimacy with  _Ajita_. From the very moment he entered her body, she instilled within him a need to fuse with her in a way that spoke of more than just physicality. He wanted this woman’s mind and her heart and her soul all to himself, just as much as he wanted her body. This was a woman he wished to become entirely one with, and for this, he couldn’t get enough of her.

Erik refused.

So much so that he became so perfectly adapted to  _being_  with this woman that her friends and family adopted him into their circle after learning of the seriousness of their relationship, readily accepting him. Nobody had a clue about his true identity or his status, including Ajita. After years of linking his value to both his identity and status, he suddenly found that he had no need for either one. So one could only imagine the sheer confusion that wracked his core when Ajita disappeared one morning after staying the night at his apartment.

After checking her pillow and finding that it was still warm, he assumed that she took a quick trip to the corner store. Maybe she didn’t want to wake him. Besides, it was only about a five minute walk. But after three hours passed, he got worried and sent her a text.

No answer.

He called.

No answer.

Before he knew it, a week passed. Then a month. Despite how much he fought it, the reality of her disappearance gradually settled into his heart. It was sickening.  _Disconcerting_. And he knew that he was using the proper word because he had several versions of the American English dictionary memorized. He was thrown off balance, bewildered, frustrated, and confused—all synonyms of that fucking word—and it was infuriating. He had inadvertently allowed this human to become his best friend, undoubtedly the best friend he’d ever had. He just never expected to become so attached to her, or to anyone for that matter. 

The word itself had a few definitions, but the first and primary defined “attached” as being joined or fastened to something. This didn’t help the situation one bit. Erik had no idea how to go about any of this because he had never been attached to anything before, much less an actual human. The only one to come to mind was Sekhmet, but this attachment to his supreme was one borne from loyalty and obligation. Fear.

But his attachment to Ajita? 

Erik’s heart always fluttered with something akin to warmth and softness whenever he thought of her, two things he never thought to even consider before crossing paths with her. He was always unsure of whether or not he was allowed to feel such things, but these very feelings just continued to blossom and grow despite his apprehension. This woman made him feel like roots had sprouted from the very pit of his stomach, just to grow into an entire forest that overtook his entire nervous system—all for her, and  _only_  for her. He was sure that she was the most perfect thing he’d ever come across, and would ever come across. His attachment to Ajita was obviously dangerous. Attachments were dangerous, period, especially to someone of his…  _lineage_. Yet there this former champion was, completely and unabashedly attached to a human woman.

_To Ajita._

And she was gone.

After allowing himself to become so friendly with her friends and family, he was too prideful to ask for their help. Anguish and desperation coursed through his veins like a raging river for the second time in his life, the first being when he had been banished from the ancestral plane. He had been surrounded by gods and goddesses then, along with demigods and demigoddesses, ancestors, and his fellow champions. This time, he was at the mercy of a human. 

A _human_ brought him back down to this terrifying place. 

It took Erik a full week. A full week of praying to the ancestors for answers, a full week of journaling for clarity, and a full week of meditation for everything else before he finally made peace with the reality of his circumstances. Only two days after this, after he decided that no human on earth was worth his time or energy, he found her in the park that he showed her. He found that the blade that he’d planted months ago was doing its job. Despite all of the leaves that coated the grass and the naked branches that reached for the sky, the park still managed to emit a beautiful glow as the fall season settled in. It reminded him of the ancestral plane. 

Erik didn’t know what spurred him to even think of visiting this place, especially since he hadn’t been there since introducing it Ajita that last time. This clearly didn’t mean that she hadn’t been doing any visiting of her own. As he carefully approached her, the imaginary sound of Bast’s sweet voice calmed his nerves and guided his steps, easing him into the realization that this human had become his ancestral plane.

His  _new_ home and his  _new_ refuge.

 _Ajita_. 

She spun around, her eyes wide with surprise at the sight of him. Had he accidentally said her name aloud? She took a step back— _away_  from him. “What are you doing here?”

The entirety of Erik’s being bristled with a strange, yet potent combination of anger and embarrassment as she looked to him with sharp eyes.  _That_ was the first thing she had to say to him after disappearing for an entire month?

“I’m the one who showed you this place,” he immediately shot back. “Fuck is  _your_ abracadabra ass doin’ here?”

If things were still normal between them, she would have laughed and let him see that cute ass double chin, right before he drew her into a kiss with a hand underneath her jaw. He never could help himself whenever he saw her double chin. But she simply pursed her lips this time, fixing them to say something smart as she rolled her tongue around in her mouth. Finally, she shook her head with a short and dismissive scoff before walking past him.

“I don’t need this shit.”

“This shit?”

“Yes, nigga,  _this shit_! All of this!  _You_! I don’t need any of it!”

A sudden gust of wind swirled around them both. Erik could feel his powers seeping out of him as he watched her walk away from him—as he watched her leave him again.  _Again_. The sound of the ancestors’ laughter filled his ears and shrouded his senses, his skin tingling at the feeling of Sekhmet’s smirk. He wanted to shut them all up. He wanted to prove them all wrong.

Erik shot a hand out to grab for her arm.

Ajita immediately turned to glare at him. “Nigga, if you don’t let me go—”

“Let you go?” he retorted, raising his voice to compete with the howling winds. “After that shit you just said to me?!”

Her nostrils flared with anger. She stepped closer to him, craning her neck to meet his eyes the best she could. “What, did I bruise your ego, pretty boy?! Go find some skinny bitch to boost it back up!”

“What?! I don’t want a skinny bitch! I want a thick bitch! Like you!”

“Oh, so now I’m a  _bitch_?!”

 _Gods_. 

This was the most ridiculous argument he’d ever been a part of, which was saying a lot considering just how old he was. This woman was being so difficult, but this anger? He hated just how much it aroused him. It reminded him of Sekhmet, yet it was nothing like his former supreme’s anger at the same time. All he knew was that he wanted to kiss Ajita hard and fuck all of that anger out of her as he’d done several times before. Maybe then she would be calm enough to explain herself.

Erik tugged her closer to himself. His entire chest swelled with pride at the soft gasp that slipped past her lips when she stumbled forward. “Who the fuck do you think you are, pullin’ a disappearin’ act like that?”

Ajita met his eyes with a challenging look. This was exactly why she was his warrior and his champion. She rarely backed down or faltered from a fight, and he loved it. 

“I didn’t think you’d actually come after me!”

“Oh, so this is just somethin’ you do?! Get a nigga to fall for you and leave?! This the type of shit you be on?!”

“N—  _No_!”

That little stutter made him glad. This human wasn’t so tough after all.

“You nervous now?” he questioned lowly, his voice laced with sharp sarcasm he was sure she felt. “You know you don’t stutter much.”

Ajita swallowed hard, but the anger in her eyes didn’t falter one bit. She pulled her arm from his grasp and took another step back. “Fuck you.”

“Fuck  _me_?”

“Yes, nigga!  _Fuck you_!”

“Fuck me, for what?! All ‘cuz you thought that you could just up and leave?! And I’d just  _let_  you without wantin’ an explanation from you?!”

The wind picked up around them, whistling and tossing fallen leaves all about as they stared each other down, right before a lone tear slid down her cheek. His fingers twitched at his sides, just itching to wipe that tear away. As if she could read his thoughts, she simply smacked her hand onto her face and wiped the tear away herself. 

Erik took a step forward.

Ajita immediately took one back.

Erik swallowed as a strange and new feeling coursed through his veins. This was a feeling he had never experienced before during his many years on earth, and he wasn’t sure if his inexperience was a good or bad thing. Maybe if he had some experience with this piece of shit emotion, he would know what the proper protocol for a moment such as this was. All he knew was that his heartbeat was irregular and his stomach had caved in. He felt heavy and down. He ached.

 _Hurt_. 

Was this hurt? Is this was this was? Erik was…  _hurt_?

Hurt was the weakest and shittiest emotion the human world had to offer. He was a god, a selfish and prideful one, and after all this time he was finally experiencing this disgusting emotion—and it was a human who’d done this to him. This very same human had broken him down.  _All_ the way down. All of a sudden, he felt the need to be humble with this woman. He needed to beg and plead his case with this woman, to be  _human_ with her, because as confusing as this whole  _hurt_ situation was, he knew that something was wrong with her. She wouldn’t be acting like this if she was okay and she mattered more him than anything or anyone else, even himself. Despite how scary the reality of that was, he knew that all he wanted was to help her.

Erik swallowed again.  _Hard_. He inhaled deeply through his nostrils.

“Why… Why’d you leave me?”

His voice was so soft that it barely touched his own ears as the winds continued to swirl around the park. This was the softest he’d ever been with anyone, even with her. The sheer vulnerability laced within his voice caught him off-guard and it seemed to do the same to her. The anger in her eyes faltered a bit as her jaw trembled. This made him glad.

“I didn’t think you’d come after me,” she repeated, her voice just as soft as his.

“Why wouldn’t I come after you?”

Ajita’s eyes widened as she hesitated, but her only response was silence.

“Did I hurt you?” he couldn’t help continuing. “Did I do something wrong?”

“Erik,” she began through gritted teeth as she wiped at her face. She sniffled. “You don’t understand.”

“Help me understand, then. Tell me what I did wrong—”

“ _Fuck._ ” Tears streamed down her cheeks as she frantically wiped them away. A choked huff spilled from her lips. “Plea— Please stop talking like that—”

“—you know I’ll fix it—”

“—just  _shut up_  and stop talking to me like that—”

“—tell me what I gotta do—”

“I’m pregnant!”

The winds stopped and the leaves fell, leaving room for an almost deafening silence. All he could do was watch as she continued to sniffle and wipe the tears from her face. It took everything within him not to look at her stomach.

“I’m pregnant,” she repeated, her voice warbling as she avoided his eyes. “I want— I  _want_ it. I wasn’t sure if you would and I didn’t want to have that conversation. So, I left.”

_A baby?_

Pregnancy had never been an idea that Erik ever felt the need to concern himself with, not with Ajita or any other woman who had come before her, simply because contraceptives existed to prevent such thoughts. The whole point of contraceptives was to not only prevent the thoughts of pregnancy, but to also prevent the actual pregnancies from occurring. However, when he considered just how reckless he’d been with her, he honestly couldn’t say that he was surprised. He couldn’t even be sure of when or where this child had been conceived, because no contraceptive on earth, no matter how powerful or how potent they were, could ever make up for how careless he’d been with this woman.

Erik was a god. He had energy and stamina to spare, especially when it came to her. He just couldn’t get enough of her. He would take her in any and every position he could whenever the opportunity presented itself. The lips of her vagina would be left puffy while her clit would be engorged to the point of acute hypersensitivity, both from his generous mouth and tongue, all before he would fuck her absolutely raw. The mixture of their essences would be leaking out of her and trailing down her inner thighs whenever he finished inside of her and instead of cleaning her with his powers like he’d done the first few times, he would just take her again and again and again. There were days when he would leave her body so beautifully used afterwards that all she could do was pass out and sleep the next day away, too tired to think of or deal with anything that had to do with contraceptives.

And Erik? He would just watch her as she slept and snorted into his chest. It was all he could do sometimes.  _He simply could not get enough of her_ ; he was practically insatiable when it came to her. The first time he touched her as his lover, he discovered that the feeling of her plush body was the physical embodiment of every single thing he’d ever associated with womanhood, both consciously and subconsciously. She was a lot squishier than he’d anticipated. This wasn’t to say that she was even more of a woman because of this or that she would be any less of a woman if the words ‘plush’ and ‘squishy’ were unable to be linked to her, because she was just that.

A woman.

Erik  _liked_ that.

He liked being able to knead the fleshy meat of her thighs without having any hard muscles get in the way. He liked to dig his fingers into the more than ample meat of her ass, and he liked to watch the ripples of the flesh there shake whenever he smacked it hard or gently. He liked to stroke the curve of her breasts and rest his head within those cushiony valleys as they spoke together late at night, until they passed out after seeing the sun peek through the window’s curtains. He liked to caress and massage the pliable meat of her hips and stomach, just to let her  _know_ that he liked just how soft she was.

Ajita wasn’t his first lover, but he couldn’t lie and say that sometimes she didn’t feel like his first. Her body called out to him; a new feeling. His memory was a bit fuzzy, but he could vaguely recall reading somewhere that being attracted to someone had something to do with at least four of the five senses, mainly: sight, smell, taste, and touch. This made sense, because sometimes all he had to do was take one look at her before being thrust into a daze, ready to eat her up or bury himself inside of her; whichever she preferred because he would do whatever she wanted. He was so intensely attracted to her that holding her close or simply grazing her skin, whether the intent of either embrace was sexual or purely wholesome, plunged him into an out-of-body experience. 

Erik’s only mistake was getting so comfortable.

This entire situation was dangerous and stupid.

And it made sense.

A  _pregnancy_ made sense. 

It would have made even more sense if Erik were not the former champion of a powerful goddess, sentenced to roam the earth for five thousand years to atone for his sin of attempting to challenge the rigid rules of the ancestral plane. This was not something that he could afford. This wasn’t something that  _Ajita_ , the human who’d unwittingly walked into all of this, could afford. Marriage, along with the topic of starting a family of their own had always been subjects he made made quick work of veering and avoiding before switching to a new topic, because the two of them simply couldn’t afford to even think of such things.

But a child… a child made sense.

This woman had broken down all of his defenses, to a point where he felt no need to clean her. He  _wanted_ to coat and stain her insides with his essence. This had been his intention each time they had sex, because she was his and his alone, just as much as he was hers. And now she was pregnant. While children had never been a thought that crossed his mined, a pregnancy with  _this_ woman made perfect sense. The longer he looked at her, the more he wanted to cultivate an entire empire built from her womb and his seed.

Erik swallowed underneath the weight of his own thoughts, rolling his tongue around in his mouth as he watched her. 

If anyone was going to be the mother of his children, of his tribe, of his family… 

It would be this woman.

This time, he took a step back. He raised his chin to regard her.

“That’s not fair.”

This was all he could say, all he could manage, because suddenly her walls were crumbling. She was falling apart right in front of him, tears just flowing out as she desperately wiped at her face. 

“I know.  _I know._  I’m sorry, I just— _Shit_ —” A choked sob escaped her throat, one that made his stomach churn uncomfortably as she struggled to speak. “I want this, and I don’t wanna lose either of you, but I want th—”

Erik walked up to her, grateful that she didn’t back up, before taking her face into his hands and drawing her into a kiss that she readily returned.  _He missed her_. An entire month without her, and he felt it all in this kiss. He pulled away to look at her and all he wanted to  _do_ was look at her. Even with those tear streaks on her full cheeks and despite her being a slobbering mess, she was still the most perfect thing he’d ever laid his eyes upon. 

He passed his thumb along her lips, gently wiping them as he attempted to compose himself. He didn’t want to scare her away with everything he was feeling. He just got her back. He didn’t want to lose her again. Not again. He swallowed. “You’re the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me. Most important thing that’s ever been mine. You think I’m tryna lose you like  _this_?”

“You can’t— You can’t just say shit like that, Erik.”

“Come on, champ,” he whispered, trying his best to soothe her. Seeing her in such a state bothered him; disturbed him. “Don’t do that. I don’t wanna see you cry.”

His words only made Ajita cry even harder. Her cheeks had risen so high that her eyes were practically scrunched up as her shoulders shook with the force of her sobs. This was the first and only time Erik had seen her so distressed, but he knew for a fact that he didn’t like it. And just like that, all of his previous anger toward her was completely forgotten. After all, she was only human. He needed to be patient with her.

This spurred him to be so soft with her, softer than he’d ever been with anyone. He wiped at her cheeks with soft swipes of his thumbs, like she was a fine piece of glass teetering on the edge of a table. He gently shushed her sobs while murmuring soft words of encouragement, each word and utterance meant to soothe her and ensure that there was no need to be afraid any longer. Before being sent to earth, he was known as the champion of Sekhmet, the destroyer. There had never been any time or room for such gentleness—no point. Yet with this woman, he just needed to make sure that she was okay and that she was fine.

“I had to get an abortion a few years ago,” Ajita managed to speak after a few moments. She sniffled. “Nobody knows, not even my mom. I didn’t wanna do it, but he made me. He didn’t want it, but  _I_ wanted to keep it and he made me choose between— I was so  _stupid_ —”

“Shit.” His anger was reborn. “Come on, don’t say that—”

“—so fucking stupid—”

“Champ—”

“I let some nigga compromise my happiness and we didn’t even last a year after that! He didn’t even try to keep me after I left! He didn’t— He didn’t come after me! He didn’t fight for this shit!”

“ _Ajita_ —”

“I want this.” Her voice wavered yet it was hard and full of resolve. “I’ve always wanted this. Please—  _Please_ don’t take this away from me. I don’t wanna to do that again.”

“You don’t have to. I want this, too.”

Ajita blinked up at him with surprised eyes. All he could do was stare right back because he surprised himself. He actually meant that shit.

“I want this, too,” he repeated, mostly for himself. The sound of her soft sob washed every bit of his apprehensions away. He flattened his thumb along the middle of her eyebrows, gently massaging her skin in an effort to get her to relax. “You can’t just leave when shit gets bad or crazy. You… You had me scared as fuck. You can talk to me. You know I’ma listen, don’t you?”

She immediately nodded, closing her eyes and bowing her head like she was a naughty child being punished. This made him place a kiss onto her forehead, a soft one that lingered much longer than it needed to. He shut his eyes and rested his forehead onto hers.

“You my warrior, remember?” he continued, his voice as soft as a whisper as the ancestors’ low murmurs slowly slithered into his ears. He paid them no mind. “You my champion. Champions don’t run. They fight. You gotta fight with me, baby, not against me. It’s me and you.”

“We… We in this together?”

“We in this together. A team.”

Ajita grabbed for his jacket. She tugged him closer to herself, almost like she didn’t believe a word he said. Like she was afraid that he would leave her. Probably the same fear he felt before finally finding her. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean any of that shit I said. I was just trying to piss you off and make you angry with me so it would be easier to let you go.”

He nodded, the curve of his nose brushing hers.

“And I’m sorry— I’m  _so_ sorry for leaving like that. I didn’t know what to do, Erik. I was scared.”

“It’s okay. It’s fine. You’re fine. You don’t have to be scared with me.”

A soft whimper rumbled in her throat, the sound cracking as she shook her head. She seemed to be holding back another cry. She sniffled. “You make this shit so hard. You’re so good to me and you treat me— you treat me so well, and it’s not fair. I’m so sorry, Erik.”

The park was quiet as they stood together. All he could hear were her sniffles and the ancestors’ low complaints. It reminded him of the ancestral plane, of a time when he would hear crickets during the night, along with the growls of panthers and the jests of his friends and family. Now she was his family, her friends were his friends and her family was his family. If he had either of his own, he would readily share both with her, but all he had to give her was himself. That seemed to be more than enough for her.

“Am… Am I still your cherished one?”

Her voice was quiet. Meek and shy. Almost scared.

“Yes.” The word slipped past his lips before he could even catch it, but he meant it. He would always mean it. He nodded. “You and you alone. Always.”

Ajita released a slow and shuddering breath, full of relief. 

“I love you,” she croaked.

The sound of the ancestors’ murmurs spiked in Erik’s ears. They were warning him, letting him know that none of them approved of what he was doing. He’s gone too far. Sex was nothing, gods needed release. A relationship was pushing it, but even ancients required companionship in order to thrive in a foreign land, especially when they were forced to roam a planet like this for five millennia. 

But a child? A proclamation of love? 

A former champion and a human— _a mortal_ —went against the very balance of nature. It wasn’t right. It was unnatural. A sin. Yet it was the first time either of them had ever said those words, and it was the first time that he had ever heard such words directed at  _him_. It felt good. It felt  _right_.

Erik opened his eyes, only to find her looking right back at him. The voices were growing louder in his ears, but that look in her wet eyes overpowered them all. It was stronger. It made him nod, forcing him to ignore those stupid voices.

“I love you,” he breathed.

Their lips met in a soft and slow kiss, one that had him wondering if she could tell that this was his first time saying those words. A weak sound escaped her, drawing a short groan from him. She just felt so good and tasted so good, and he wanted to enjoy every bit of this goodness. He was sure that this was an experience he would never be able to share with anyone else, because  _this_ was his woman. This was his partner, his mate, and the love of his life. He was absolutely sure of it during this very moment, and he knew that he would be just as sure, if not even more sure, after this. He wanted her, and them, forever.

Erik wanted Ajita forever.

With that final realization, the voices stopped.

_____

The journey to Erik’s apartment was quiet, a moment of contemplative silence that he used in order to collect his thoughts and nerves. It was full of random kisses to Ajita’s forehead and into the palm of her hand, along with the sweet caresses of her fingertips onto his hip underneath his jacket.  _They missed each other._  With each step he took, he was forced to come to the conclusion that this whole  _love_ situation was a lot more than just a foreign emotion that he couldn’t put a finger on. It felt like he had been submerged in a lake filled with the strongest wine while somehow remaining completely inebriated. His brain felt like it was on the verge of insanity, yet he felt perfectly calm. Such conflicting emotions should have scared and worried him, but he was absolutely okay—because this was  _her_.

Erik had to fight to keep himself from ghosting his hand over her stomach as they approached the entrance to his home, because he was immediately on her the moment they closed the door. He took her face into his hands to kiss her hard and rough. He tugged her clothes off and threw them onto the floor. He smacked her ass and made her shout into his mouth as she held him close, her nails digging into his skin in a way that hurt so good. And the more he kissed her, the tighter she held him, the louder she moaned…

His anger returned. Along with the desperation.

He almost lost her—she almost  _left_ him—and all he wanted was to make her pay for worrying him like this.

“Erik!  _Fuck_!”

Ajita’s body jolted as if she’d been struck by lightning as another orgasm coursed through her body. Both the hem and the top of her dress were bunched and bundled at her hips as he took her on his kitchen counter, exposing her bare breasts for him. He loved to touch and suck and admire them. All he could do was watch as they bounced from the force of his movements, her legs spread beautifully wide for him, and only him.

_Him, and only him._

Placing a shaking hand onto his stomach, she attempted to back away, just to have him hold her in place as he moved to massage her clit. The groan she released was so animalistic that it made him proud.

 “I’m right here,” he declared as he dug his fingertips into the meat of her thigh. A moan of appreciation rumbled deep within his throat at how soft she was. He pulled her closer. “Where you goin’?”

“N—Nowhere—”

“You tryna run?”

“N—No, I—”

“You think I’ma let your ass go again?”

“Shit, Er— _rik_!”

Erik could only watch as she writhed and moaned before him. Normally, he would have gone easier on her. He would have been slower and softer for her, giving her enough time and space to catch up to him, but not tonight. She looked gorgeous and she  _was_ gorgeous. The dim light of the kitchen reflected beautifully off of her skin, giving her an almost ethereal glow as she rolled her hips to meet his thrusts. Her dark skin used to make him think of sweet and wholesome things, like butterflies fluttering away on warm summer days or children chasing after fireflies on cool summer evenings. But now that dark skin made him think of terrifying things, things that involved the words:  _forever and always_ , and  _I love you_.

Erik dismissed the thought with a low growl. “You want me to stop?”

“No, don’t— don’t stop,” she gasped.

“Why? Why don’t you want me to stop?”

“Because you— Because you feel so good! Shit, I’m gonna cum!”

“Shut the fuck up and cum, then.”

Ajita shut her eyes, throwing her head back with a sharp cry of his name as she allowed her orgasm to wash over her senses. The sight made the pit of his stomach constrict. He knew that she liked it when he was mean to her during sex, but he meant it all this time. Every word. So he spread her legs wider with a harsh grunt as he pounded into her dripping pussy, fucking her through her orgasm as she screamed and came all over his dick, creaming on him and soaking the counter. While the entire scene should have given him a clue that she’d had enough, it only encouraged him to keep going.

That desperation and anguish he felt? Those shitty human feelings? Erik wanted her to feel that, too. All of it. He probably needed to be kinder to her body throughout all of this. She was pregnant—with  _his_ baby—and he knew that humans were built much more delicately than gods, but fuck.  _Fuck_. If he wasn’t a selfish and jealous god in love, he didn’t know what he was.

The thought made him stop, the sounds of their pants and breathless gasps bouncing off of the kitchen walls. He watched as she laid onto the counter, writhing with soft moans and swallowing shallowly. She probably needed the cold surface to calm her nerves.

“You’re crazy, Erik,” she whispered. “Crazy as fuck. So fucking craz— So crazy.”

All Erik could do was watch her. He could watch her all night long, quite frankly.  _He missed her_. He swallowed before pulling her up for a kiss. He couldn’t believe he almost lost her. Just the thought was enough to reignite the fire of anger within his stomach.

“Nah,” he spoke against her lips. He bit into her bottom one and gave it a gentle tug, drawing a sigh from her. He kissed her lips again before bracing his hands underneath her thighs and carrying her to the living room couch as she continued to kiss him. Just like that first time. “ _You_  crazy.”

Erik placed Ajita on her hands and knees, pride rushing through his veins at how shaky her thighs were as she desperately grabbed for a stray cushion. Her entire ass was wet and glistening from her own juices, a sight that had him ready to burst, right then and there. At that he plunged into her, giving her no time to prepare or adjust before grabbing her by the hips and taking her from the back with hard strokes.

“ _Erik!_ ” she screamed. A choked and garbled moan escaped her. “Oh my—  _Shit_!”

The neighbors would probably complain tomorrow, but he didn’t give a single fuck. He  _wanted_  them to hear this. He wanted  _everyone_  to hear this. He wanted everyone within that apartment complex to know that this woman was his, and that he was taking her again and again. He wanted everyone to know that he was thoroughly ruining her and that she was allowing it—that she  _wanted_  it—because  _he_  was who  _she_  truly wanted. This woman was who he truly wanted and she knew it, they both did, and he needed everyone to know it, too.

“Shut up and keep that arch,” he commanded, his voice as rough as gravel. All she could do was whisper his name and mutter on and on about how good he felt with a shuddering voice. It made him smack her ass. “Pissin’ me off like that. And you pissed me off real good, too, you know that?”

“You— You’re crazy—”

A groan slipped past her lips, interrupting her as she threw her head back with a harsh moan. He smacked her ass again.

“ _Erik_!”

“Answer me when I talk to you,” he demanded through gritted teeth. “Do you know how fuckin’ angry you got me?”

“Y—Yes, I know! I’m sorry! Baby, I’m so—” She gasped, moving to brace herself onto her forearms. “ _Sh—Shit._ ”

A rough and guttural groan spilled from Erik’s lips. As angry as he was, he couldn’t deny how fucking good she felt. She was wet as fuck and he could hear that pussy talking to him. That thing was his; they both knew it. He also knew that clit was wonderfully engorged. It was practically calling his name before he gave in and reached over to touch it, gently stroking it with the padding of his fingers.

Ajita buried her face into the cushion as her body convulsed, screaming so harshly that he was sure her throat would be sore the next day. Normally, he would have just allowed her to relax after this before she took him into her mouth and brought him to release. But tonight, he wanted her to feel this.

Erik kissed his way up her sweaty back. He licked and bit at her shoulders as he pressed himself against her, allowing her to feel the pressure of his chest against her buzzing skin. She probably would have liked the feeling of his markings. Snaking his free arm around her waist, he hugged her closer to himself as he started up again. A sharp gasp escaped her, the sound practically caressing his ears as she trembled underneath him.

He wanted her to take this.

The most beautiful sloshing and squelching sounds filled the air as she creamed him all the way up. That pussy just dripped and reacted so well to him. He almost lost all of this  _and_  a baby.

He moved to slide his fingers into her mouth and she raised her head from its position on the cushion, bracing herself onto her hands like she knew. It honestly wouldn’t have surprised him if she did. Ajita took his fingers into her mouth, sucking her juices off and swirling her tongue around them with a low moan. She sounded so fucking good.

Erik slipped his fingers out of her mouth to wrap them around her neck. He couldn’t see her face, but he knew that she looked even better like that. The soft,  _yes,_  she gave encouraged him. “You sorry? Had me worried sick, thinkin’ some shit happened to you. Thinkin’ that  _I_  did some shit to you. I can’t even remember the last time I was this angry, and you sorry. I’m the crazy one, right?”

“ _Shit_ , you fuckin’ me so good, baby,” she slurred. “Keep goin’, just like that. You feel— You feel so good.”

He would have returned the sentiment had he not been so angry. He would have told her how good she looked with his fingers around her neck. He would have told her how wet she was and how well she was taking him. Instead, he swallowed down a growl. “Gimme a kiss, warrior.”

Ajita immediately reached out to grab for his hair to pull his face closer. She kissed him so slow and so deep, a complete and stark contrast to just how harshly he was fucking her, that it made his stomach turn. He could feel his desire sparking for her all over again. All for her, and only for her. The moan that she slipped into his mouth was soft and gentle, as soft as he made himself for her and as soft as the way he felt for her.

And he loved her.

Her, and only her.

Erik pulled away to watch her. Tiny beads of sweat slid along the curve of her cheek, her eyes shut as she panted and groaned. She had no clue just how closely he was watching her; no clue just how perfect she was to him. He just couldn’t stop watching her. He didn’t want her out of his sight. He almost lost her. Before he knew it, he was placing a kiss onto her temple. He couldn’t help it, because despite how angry he was with her,  _he almost lost her_. 

He almost lost everything.

_Fucking desperation._

“Don’t do that shit again.”

His voice was low and almost soft. It scared him.  _She_  scared him. This entire situation scared him, but he wanted every bit of it all. He needed it—he needed  _her_.

“Please,” Erik begged.  _Begging_. He bit into his bottom lip and moved to place a kiss onto her cheek with a soft swear before resting his forehead onto her temple. He shut his eyes when she grabbed for his wrist, her nails digging into his skin. What did she do to him? “ _Please_  don’t do that shit again, Ajita.”

“I won’t,” she managed.

‘We gon’ have a real problem if you do, you understand me?”

“I underst— I understand,” she choked out.

“You love me?”

“I love you so much, baby!”

A low moan escaped him. That sounded so good coming from her. He didn’t think that he would ever indulge himself in something as stupid and fleeting as love, but it was  _her_. And she was everything.

“Again,” he demanded. “Say that shit again.”

“I love you, Er— Shit, I love you, Erik!”

Erik could not fucking believe that he’d gotten himself into such a situation.  _Love_. Yet he wanted to dive right in with her— _for_  her. He released his grip on her neck and pulled out of her, turning her over to place her on her back and spread her wide. The sight of all that creamy wetness made his nostrils flare before he slid into her and placed a soft and lingering kiss onto her lips. It made her release a shuddering whimper and grab for his hair as he moved within her with slow yet endlessly deliberate strokes.

“I love you.” He kissed her. “I love you.” A kiss. “I love you.”

Ajita tugged at his dreads with a sharp gasp. “I’m gonna cum—”

“With all of me.” A kiss. “And every bit of me.”

“ _Erik_ , baby, please—”

“It’s you.” A kiss. “It’s always gonna be you.”

“I can't—”

“ _You_  fill my heart with joy and happiness.” A kiss. “ _You_  give life new meaning with each sunrise.”

A whimper spilled from her lips. “I love you so much, baby.”

“So don’t you fuckin’  _do_  that shit again—”

“I promise I won't—  _Fuck_ —”

He gave her another kiss, groaning against her lips while swallowing the choked moan she slipped into his mouth. “ _I love you, Ajita_ —”

_“Shit, Erik!”_

The sound of wet skin slapping against even wetter skin was loud in his ears as she shut her eyes, mouth falling open with silent screams. It all made him bury his face into her neck with a grunt, finding comfort in just how readily she hugged him close. He just couldn’t look at her. He needed her to cum before he did.

Erik slid a hand down to rub his thumb over her clit. She jolted with a shout of his name and attempted to back away. He held her place as she twitched, swallowing a growl down as he shut his eyes.  “You not quittin’ yet, are you? You too strong for that, warrior. You strong. You invincible and unconquerable, champion.  _My_ champion—”

“Oh, my God, Erik! You’re so fucking crazy!”

“—so you can take this dick, champ. Right? You can cum all over it again, warrior.”

“ _I can’t stand you_!”

“All I need is one more. You got one more for me, champ?”

Ajita screamed his name to the heavens as she came, her entire body shaking as she grunted. Her walls pulsated around his member and milked him of everything he had. Just hearing her like that and feeling her cum pushed him over the edge as he joined her in ecstasy with a long and drawn out groan, making him release himself into her.

Erik attempted to steady his breathing as he raised his head to look to her, moving to stand on his knees before her. Her eyes were still closed, her chest was heaving, and he couldn’t stop looking at her stomach. Her skin was wet with sweat and there was a creamy mess between her thighs that only a hot shower could clean up. He would join her and be gentle with her in the tub, apologizing for his harshness as he passed the loofah over her back and kissed her shoulders and the nape of her neck. He would kiss her hips and stomach as he passed the washcloth between her thighs, along with a few kisses to her nose and forehead as she wrapped a towel around her body. He would spread Shea butter all over her once she was done drying. Maybe he would make love to her. No fucking. Just tender lovemaking, softer this time around. Gentler and kinder intimacies as he kissed her lips and spoke to her, telling her of just how perfect she was, how happy she made him, and how much he loved her. 

The thought of it all made his penis twitch with excitement as he continued to watch her. Even though he just had her, he wanted her again. He would always want her.

 _His_  champion.  _His_  cherished one.

Ajita opened her eyes with a choked sigh, watching him from behind heavy lids. She probably felt his arousal returning. “Fuck, Erik, You’re so good at this shit.”

Erik pursed his lips. He wanted so badly to just tell her that fucking joke that’s been running through his mind since their first time together and tell her that he had more than one thousand years of experience of fucking on the ancestral plane under his belt. He fucked actual goddesses, demigoddesses, and ancestors, along with another one thousand years of fucking humans on earth. None of those beings could ever be compared to her, and not a single one of those experiences could hold a candle to what he had with her. This quickly morphed into his desire to want to tell her his true name and who he was. He wanted to tell her everything. 

He reached out to touch her stomach to keep himself quiet. His touch was tentative, almost nervous as his fingers grazed her skin. He’d never felt a pregnant stomach before, and quite frankly, he’d never wanted to until this moment. She took him by the wrist to help him, easing him into it and placing his hand flat onto her stomach with his fingers spread out.

Erik clenched his jaw.

Bast had been in this stomach. 

It had been so long since he last felt her, but he definitely recognized and felt remnants of the most high’s presence. This was a presence he wouldn’t soon forget, especially since it was mixed with his and Ajita’s. The most perfect concoction was inside of her—inside of a human—and life was being formed. 

 _Life_.

Erik never understood why T’Challa had always been so fond of the humans. His supreme was Bast, the giver of life and the matron goddess of fertility. The most high. He was strong and powerful, an even match for Erik in battle. He had no reason to be so enamored by the ways of such weak humans. But as he and Ajita continued to watch each other, the soft sweeps of his thumb along her stomach making her hold his wrist tighter, all he could think was…

No wonder.

“I’m sorry, Erik,” Ajita whispered as she gently massaged his wrist. “I mean that.”

Those imaginary flecks of gold caught his eyes as they reflected off of her skin, disappearing just as quickly as they appeared. He dismissed it as a trick of the night, biting into his lip and nodding. With a deep sigh, he finally relaxed his hand onto her stomach.

“You havin’ my baby.”

His voice was soft. It scared him into swallowing hard. It should have bothered him just how well this one woman had broken down his defenses. She was just one person. She wasn’t even a goddess, a demigoddess, or an ancestor. She was just…  _human_. Yet she alone had the strength to do this to him; to make him so weak and to make him want to be human right along with her. There was nothing left to uncover. It scared him even more just how readily he was willing to accept this. 

After one thousand years on earth, Erik had finally found his place and home.

It was her.

Ajita nodded, a little smile gracing her lips. “Yeah.”

Her voice was soft, just like his, as if she was in just as much awe as he was. This made a soft little hum slip past his throat as a smile of his own stretched across his face. He brought her foot up to his mouth and kissed her heel, her toes uncurling right before his eyes.

“You ready for a shower, cherished one?” Erik asked.

Ajita nodded again, her smile growing. That cute ass double chin finally appeared. “Yeah.”


	7. part five.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there are strong mentions of death and suicide in this chapter. i don’t want to trigger anyone, so please, if this warning applies to you: do not read. i really don’t want anyone to be set off or triggered by anything i write.

_part five._

* * *

Bast was at work. Indefinitely.

It took a little over one thousand years of living on earth for Erik to finally come to the realization that the most high was what the humans would call an empath. According to Merriam-Webster’s dictionary, an empath is a person who experiences the emotions of others. It almost seemed unnecessary for the most powerful being in humanity to have such a gift. She could do anything and be anything; why did experiencing the feeble emotions of others have to be included? Yet Bast never made it seem like harboring this gift of empathy was a difficult or necessarily easy task. In fact, it always seemed to be right smack-dab in the middle of the spectrum—neutral.

Erik remembered his life on the ancestral plane well, which included certain days when Bast’s empathy seemed to come in handy. Whenever the demigods and demigoddesses, the gods and goddesses, the ancestors, and the champions were at odds with one another, moments which came frequently, her empathy helped her gauge whether or not someone truly had vile intentions with their argument or if they were truly confused. Empathy also seemed to be a powerful extension of her great might, particularly whenever she was having a bad day. All she needed to do was come into contact with a high-spirited and jovial personality, and her dark cloud would immediately be lifted.

T’Challa and Hanuman were especially perfect for those days.

There was also a dark side to her empathic powers, as there was with everything within the universe. The yin versus the yang; the shady side versus the bright side. Although she was the ruler of the ancestral plane, the fact that she was a goddess still remained. That prideful and almost dangerously arrogant blood still coursed through her veins and no one could deny this heritage. Not even her.

Erik noticed that it always seemed so much easier for her to draw from the dark energies that surrounded her because of this. The dark powers within her would literally reach out to the darkness, something that he understood. He struggled with this everyday while living in the human realm and to know that the most high, the most powerful creature within all of humanity struggled with the same thing, he empathized. As an ancient lower-level god who lived amongst the humans for an entire millennia, he also sympathized. She once confided in him that this put her in a dark place and made her want to isolate herself more than usual because all of the fighting she did inside made her tired. Horrible thoughts would fill her mind and make her cringe; sometimes she even felt like all she needed to do was take one step, and she would be on the wrong side of humanity. Some days, the energies were not inherently evil, just dull enough to make her feel gloomy and exhausted. Whenever these moments hit, it immediately became her responsibility to monitor both her emotions and the emotions of those who were affecting her, simply because she was so acutely aware of it all.

Without a doubt, he noticed that the simplest days for Bast would be whenever the energies that surrounded her did not come from the shady side— _yin_ —or from the bright side— _yang_. The simplest days came whenever everything, energies and all, balanced themselves perfectly in the middle: in neutral. Just like now, the energies that Erik felt surrounding him did not rest on the side of either yin or yang, and everything was balancing themselves out pretty well. He knew that everything was balancing themselves out pretty well because, once again, he  _felt_ it. He felt  _her_.

Erik felt Bast.

The soft spot that she’d had for him used to be a source of pride when he lived in the ancestral plane, one that made him hold his chin up just a bit higher. His heart would skip a beat whenever she would invite him to join the morning strolls she took with her own champion, T’Challa. She would joke with them and make them laugh, all while imparting words of wisdom that he still carried with him to this day as he lived on earth. There were evenings when she even sat on the ground to eat with him as they watched baby panthers and baby gorillas play with one another as the sun set. So when she looked away from him as Sekhmet prepared herself to cast him out of the ancestral plane, he was ashamed to know that he’d lost her favor. But to see her at work with the mother of his child, her own version of mercy, was the highest blessing.

And Bast was at work.  _Indefinitely_.

Bast, the most high, was the goddess of sensuality and sexual pleasure. She reigned over the fertility of both humans and animals, protecting them and their homes from the beginning of the birthing process to the end. Month after month, Erik watched as subtle changes took over Ajita’s body. Her round face became plumper and her nose spread beautifully wide, her hair grew thicker while shedding at the same time, and her dark skin glowed like the moon lived inside of her. He knew that Bast blessed women with pregnancies, but he had never seen it for himself, and quite frankly? He’d never wanted to. But for as long as he had lived, both on earth and on the ancestral plane, he had never encountered anything that could compare to the beauty of pregnancy. It was the greatest thing he’d ever seen.

An entire millennia passed since he had last seen Bast, but he recognized her work. He saw it and felt it every day. Sometimes he would catch little wisps of her fingertips grazing Ajita’s rounding stomach early in the morning as she slept, fleeting kisses to the apples of her glowing cheeks, and even light hugs that would make that growing double chin pop out to say  _hello!_ as she smiled. Erik acknowledged it all, but he said nothing. He simply allowed it. He even caught himself praying to Bast one morning, because  _his_  cherished one was being taken care of by the most high, herself.

What greater blessing was there?

As Ajita’s third trimester steadily came to a close and they approached her eighth month of pregnancy, Erik noted that he was well past his five-year mark. Tavel. Settle. Adapt. Leave. This was the cycle he had been forced to follow every 25 years. However, once he discovered that he had the capacity to become just as attached as the humans, he cut it down to five years. If things were still normal, he would have been preparing himself to leave Harlem at around this time in order to adapt to another culture and create yet another life for himself. But things weren’t even remotely close to being normal anymore. The dumbass cycle he’d been following brought him to a new sens of normalcy, one that led him to fucking Harlem, which led him to Ajita, and Ajita… His champion and his cherished one… She destroyed all of the control and discipline that took him one thousand years to establish in just one year by leading him to love, a baby, and a baby shower.

 _A baby shower_.

It was his first baby shower, but he quickly learned that it was a human celebration for tiny humans, one that brought him friends and family. These were all her friends and her family that she shared with him because he had none of his own, all of whom readily accepted and loved him without question. It was amazing to experience that made him wonder why he hadn’t allowed himself to do this all those one thousand years ago. It also made him wonder why Sekhmet had always been so nasty toward the humans, because no other experience with any other creature, human or not, could compare to everything he had experienced with Ajita. He wasn’t the most high, a demigod, or an ancestor, but he knew this.

 _He knew._ And he was fine, even as he lived amongst the humans.

Erik was happy.

This happiness of his was one that he felt blessed enough to be able share with someone else, namely Ajita, and it was only magnified when the time came for her to give birth. He felt completely helpless as he watched her. Her eyes were screwed shut and her teeth were clenched as her jaw trembled with the screams she managed to keep at bay. All he could do was stand at her side the entire time, praising her and offering words of encouragement as she crushed his hand with her own. Throughout it all, from the beginning to the end, he could have sworn that he’d never seen her look more beautiful than in the moment in which she was giving birth to their child. She performed wonderfully—his champion and his cherished one.

And then it happened. 

A boy. His boy. 

 _Theirs_.

The most potent brand of unbridled joy coursed through Erik’s veins as he watched the doctor clean their son before handing him to Ajita. As she whispered sweet words to the baby, he could only bury his tear-striken face into her disheveled hair because he heard how the tiny human’s heartbeat matched his mother’s. He supposed that it made sense for the beats to be in perfect sync. He just came from her, after all, and it was the loudest and strongest heartbeat he’d heard from a human thus far.

Every third beat.

_Ba-dum. Ba-dum. Ba-dum._

It made him smile.

“Do you know what star-crossed lovers are?”

The sound of Bast’s voice, smoother than freshly woven silk, wafted into his ear from his memories to transport him back to his true home. The ancestral plane. Soft flutes and drums followed, along with rhythmic chanting. He attempted to ignore it all and shake it off, but to no avail. Before he knew it, he was sitting within the soft grass of the plainlands at night with his back against a tree, watching as the little panthers and little gorillas played with one another.

“Lovers who are thwarted by misfortune,” Bast continued, her voice growing stronger and more present with each spoken syllable. “Lovers who care for each other, are meant to be together, who love each other immensely, but their circumstances pit them apart. Unfavored by the stars.”

N’Jadaka turned his head, only to find the most high sitting beside him. Her brown skin glowed like melted gold as the fire stoked from within the pit, the wood cracking from the pressure. She took a stray stick that laid beside her and threw it at the two animals, her full lips curving into a smile at the sound of the little panther’s weak growl as it fought the gorilla for it’s new toy. This little panther would grow to be a strong one.

“Ill-fated,” he declared.

Bast nodded in approval. “Long ago, when the ancestral plane was first formed, there were only two beings to roam the land. Their names were Ramonda and T’Chaka. As the only two creatures of and in this world, they soon became lovers. They spent so much time together that their heartbeats melded to form one beat. One day, Ramonda went wandering alone and came across another being: N’Jobu. This surprised her. After all, there were only supposed to be two creatures within the ancestral plane—her and her mate, T’Chaka.”

N’Jadaka’s brows knitted in the middle as he watched her. He was confused. Not by the story, but the point of it. But the most high never spoke or shared if she didn’t find it necessary, so he decided to indulge her.

“Did Ramonda fall in love with the other man?” he asked.

Bast’s smile stretched. She looked away from the animals to meet his curious eyes, her own bright, knowing, and… somber? She nodded and reached over to place her hand flat against his bare chest and over his heart. Her touch was warm.

 _Ba-dum. Ba-dum. Ba-dum_ , Erik heard as he continued to bury his nose into Ajita’s hair.

“T’Chaka didn’t have to see them together to know that Ramonda had fallen for another,” Bast declared, dragging him back into his memories. She retracted her hand and her gaze returned to the two animals who’d settled on sharing the stick. “He felt it. The beat was off. So, he placed a curse onto them and onto every generation of lovers. From that day on, anyone who fell deep enough in love in order to have their heartbeats match were destined for disaster.”

“Ill-fated,” N’Jadaka repeated quietly.

The sound of the baby gorilla’s soft whine worked to relax his nerves. He wished that she would just reveal the point of all this. His creator, Sekhmet, never toyed with him like this. She preferred to get straight to the point, something that he always appreciated. That growing smile on Bast’s face seemed to be teasing him, almost like she knew that he was growing frustrated with her. This wouldn’t have shocked him. She was the most high, after all, and as far as everyone else knew, she was aware of all things and there was no other being who could argue otherwise.

So, he took a calming breath. “T’Chaka was a selfish one.”

Bast pursed her lips. “I suppose so.”

“It’s not very fair, though. Is it?”

“He still allowed people to fall in love.”

“Only to have them separated once their heartbeats matched up. It’s unfair.”

_Ba-dum. Ba-dum. Ba-dum._

A pregnant pause filled the air before Bast raised her chin to watch the sky. “T’Chaka… That man should have been happy that he was able to experience the love that he did and allowed someone else to have the chance to do the same. Instead, he acted like a child. A stupid curse that a selfish man cast because his heart got broken.”

N’Jadaka’s features twisted and turned as they worked to create a look of confusion. “This is only a fairytale. You don’t actually believe it. Do you, great Bast?”

“You shouldn’t denounce legends,” she teased. “The gods will hear.”

“You  _are_ a god,” he returned with a short smile.

Bast chuckled, the sound low and soothing as her eyes fell shut. She released a slow sigh through her parted lips.

_Ba-dum. Ba-dum. Ba-dum._

“It really is unfair.” Her voice was softer than a whisper as it faded away, along with her image. “Isn’t it?”

 _Ba-dum_.

Erik’s eyes snapped open.

_Four?_

It was supposed to be three. The beat. It was off. 

Why the fuck was the beat off?

Faster than Erik’s eyes could capture and comprehend, his choking son was pulled out of Ajita’s arms for emergency surgery. Erik could barely understand a thing that was happening, just that his son had been taken away from them as quickly as he was given to them. One minute, the baby was fine and healthy and the next, something was wrong with his heart—and Erik heard it. He heard the switch up in the beats, noticed it before the doctors knew what was wrong, so he knew what would happen next.  _He knew._  Yet it still hurt to hear the doctors say them that their son didn’t make it.

For the first time in over a millennia, Erik felt compelled to pray to Sekhmet. He couldn’t go to the most high for this one; not this time. Sekhmet’s punishment was what led him to Ajita, and Ajita… She was sad. Broken. This baby was something that she’d always wanted and all he wanted was her happiness. He couldn’t help thinking that maybe this entire situation was his fault, that maybe he’d done something wrong. Humans were weak creatures, especially newborns, and maybe if he’d listened to the ancestors when they told him to stay away from her… Maybe their son— Maybe  _her_ son, the one that she could have had with another, would have never—

Erik leaned over the hospital bed, taking Ajita’s face into his hands. He couldn’t make this about him. It wasn’t about him. Not anymore, and not since she showed up. It was about them. So he wiped her tears away as gently as he could, with soft swipes of his thumbs.

“Hey, champ,” he spoke. He ignored how unsteady his voice was, choosing instead to place a lingering kiss onto her sweaty forehead. He sniffled. “You did a great job, warrior. Pushin’ that baby out like that.”

The corners of Ajita’s mouth wobbled as they curved upwards, her vain attempt at a smile, before a choked sob escaped her. The haunting sound filled the room as she grabbed for his wrists, her fingertips digging into his skin as she finally broke down. Her shoulders shook from the force of her sobs and her ragged breaths reverberated from the walls. All he could do was continue placing his kisses onto her forehead as his jaw trembled, his voice lost to his emotions. He felt so unbelievably heavy all of a sudden. Human shit.

“It’s okay,” he managed as his throat threatened to close up.  _Human shit_. He swallowed as he dug his fingers into her hair to gently massage her scalp. He knew she liked that. “We can— We can try again.”

A short whine slipped past Ajita’s trembling lips before she surrendered with a nod, a quick wince contorting her features for a second. She watched him carefully for a moment before allowing her eyes to flutter shut. She swallowed. “You’re different. I… I knew you were different.”

“Watchu mean, champ?”

She hesitated, biting into her bottom lip. “Sometimes you glow.”

Erik’s fingers stopped moving against her scalp. His eyes roamed the expanse of her full face, slowly taking in every bit of her. It was his turn to hesitate. “I glow?”

“Yeah,” she continued with a nod. She cleared her throat. “It’s… weird. I always wondered if anyone else ever saw it. Thought I was going crazy, but it was pretty.”

It finally clicked why she always called him “pretty boy.” A slight chuckle escaped him, one that made a little smile touch her lips. The sight made him so glad that he saw no point in denying anything she said. He kissed her forehead. “What color was it? The glow?”

“Orange? Gold? Something close to that.”

“You saw it in the grocery store?”

“Yeah.”

“And you still?”

“Yeah.”

Erik’s eyes welled up with tears as the pit of his stomach caved in. Those flecks of gold had always been real. It had never been his imagination and it had never even been her. It was him. She’d had a hold on him from the very beginning. It was then that he finally noticed the how the rhythm of her own heartbeat switched up. There would be no point in praying to anybody now. It took everything within him not to look away from her as he bit into his trembling bottom lip. He quickly wiped the tears away before they could fall and touch her face, right before he resumed massaging her scalp.

“Did it scare you?” he asked.

Ajita immediately shook her head, assured and certain. “You never scared me. You told me so. Should I have been scared?”

Erik could feel himself choking up, but he shook his head. He swallowed all of that shit down. “Nah, champ, you know you don’t have to be scared with me. You just never mentioned it,”

 “I didn’t think you’d want me to. Nobody else noticed.” She shrugged; tried to. It was a weak raising of her shoulders as she gave a low hum. “I saw what you did for the flowers in my mom’s garden, the way you made them bloom early. The same thing you did at that park. You really glowed, then.”

He reached over to press the call button beside the bed. “I know how much y’all liked those flowers. Had to keep my girl and her mother happy.”

She tried to smile, but it was weak. “You never got sick, not even when I coughed in your face or sneezed everywhere. You were always… You were always fine. I think I saw a mosquito die after stinging you.”

He snorted. “Aight, now you bein’ dramatic.”

Her smile stretched. “I’ve never even seen you get the chills.”

“That’s not true. I always get the chills when I’m with you.”

“ _Corny_.”

Erik chuckled and Ajita laughed, right before a nasty cough interrupted her. She was leaving him. He could feel bits and pieces of her essence passing right through him. It was all strong enough to make him release his hold on her face and fall to his knees, taking her hand into his. The perfect position to pray. They had no mercy on him, but why should they? He knew better. But her? She was just a human—only human. She had no clue. Death was inevitable for all humans, but it didn’t mean that they deserved it. Maybe she would have a chance if he interceded on her behalf. Maybe they would listen, just this once.

He toyed with the ring around her finger.

Not her.

Erik pressed the button again, more urgently. “Great Bast—”

“You never told me if my name fits me.”

“It does,” he answered instantly. Invincible and unconquerable. A warrior and a champion. This was the meaning of her name, and quite frankly, he should have known that something would go wrong. He should have been smarter about this. He should have listened. He swallowed that lump down. “Your parents did well by giving you this name. You gon’ fight for me, warrior? Be my champion?”

She nodded. It was slow and barely even a nod, but it worked for him.

He kissed her ring. He’d searched so hard for that ring. “Your heartbeats matched.”

“Yeah?” she asked as another smile touched her lips, brighter and stronger than the last. “You heard it?”

Erik nodded, opening her hand to place a kiss into her palm. “It was strong. Sounded like a grown man.”

Ajita laughed, a sweet sounded that lifted his spirits before a sob slipped through. She took a moment to compose herself, her shoulders shaking with her silent cries. She sniffled, opening her eyes to finally meet his. They were tired and devoid of the magic that normally lined them. “I’m about to die, aren’t I?”

He nodded, the curve of his nose grazing her palm.

“Did you know? When our son was going to—”

He nodded again.

She whimpered. The sound was weak. “I feel it. You’re not gonna leave me, are you?”

“No.” He slowly released his hold on the call button. There was no point in it and no point in his plan to intercede. If she could feel that death was coming just as strongly as he could, then the ancestors had already come to a decision. No human doctor, no matter how gifted or educated, could stand in the way of what they had planned. The humans would only prolong it and the suffering. So he stood to take her face back into his hands, leaning over to kiss her forehead. “I’d never leave you. I’m right here.”

“I’m scared,” Ajita choked out. “It hurts. I don’t— I don’t know what to do— I’m scared—”

“Hey, didn’t tell you that you didn’t need to be scared when you with me?”

But Erik was scared, too. For the first time in a long time, since the night of his expulsion from the ancestral plane, he was scared. A tear slipped out and he quickly wiped it away.

“My name is N’Jadaka,” he confessed, his voice cracking.

“N’jadaka,” she sounded out. It was the best he’d ever heard her. “I told you, you didn’t look like an Erik.”

A short smile stretched across his face. “I was created by the goddess, Sekhmet. Can you say that?”

“Sek—” A cough interrupted her as she nodded, determined. “Sekhmet.”

“I was her champion. I fought for her in war. I was her cherished one, everything you are for me. You hear me, baby?”

“I’m tired,” she slurred as her eyes fluttered shut. “Just… Just need a quick nap.”

A shaky whimper escaped Erik, tears spilling from his eyes to land on her cheeks. “Close your eyes. I’ll be here. Just lemme pray for you, real quick.”

Ajita coughed. “Since when… Since when do you pray, nigga?”

“Since now, lil nigga.”

Erik expected a sharp retort, but she remained quiet. Another whimper escaped him. It was stronger, almost like a soft groan. He didn’t know what he was feeling, but  _fuck_. He hated it. He hated all of this human shit. “I’m a little over 2000 years old, not 25. I was cast out of the ancestral plane for treason against my supreme. Lemme tell you everything before you go.”

Silence filled the room as he awaited her response. The heart monitor gave a long beep, right before the doctor and her team rushed into the room to revive her. He could only watch. They were too late, not that it would have mattered ten minutes ago. He felt her leave. Her essence passed through  _his_ body—and he was pissed.

All of a sudden, Erik was screaming out at the sky. He didn’t know how or when he got outside, and he didn’t care who saw or heard him. He only cared that Sekhmet heard him calling out to her bitch ass. The wind blew all around him and the collective voice of the ancestors were gathering in his ears, urging him to stop and show respect. 

He didn’t care.

He was hurt. He was angry. He just wanted his family back.

“You want me to show y’all some fuckin’ respect?!” he screamed. “I’ve  _been_ showin’ yall respect for the past one thousand years! And this is what I get?!  _This shit_?! Was this all a part of that stupid punishment?! To make sure that I stay in line?!”

“Mind your tone!” Sekhmet’s voice stood strong in the midst of the ancestors’ murmuring and the strong winds. She sounded angry, just as angry as he was. “You knew that there would be consequences when dealing with a human!”

“So that was enough of a reason for you to kill her?!”

“The human was a test! You were up for parole! I was going to lessen your sentence and you failed!”

That was all Ajita was? A  _test_? And they killed her? 

All Erik had ever wanted was to return to his home, the ancestral plane, but he no longer wanted to have anything to do with them. It wasn’t rare for gods to fight and become angry with one another. Hell, it was normal. They were powerful beings, each in their own right, and pride often got in the way of true camaraderie as such. But they stole his true home from him. They killed his refuge. Pure hatred was boiling within him as the winds picked up around him.

“Why is this happening?! Why would you allow me to become so comfortable with my loneliness before thrusting that woman into my life?! Why would you give me a family?! Why would you give me happiness?! All before and only before taking them both away from me?! Answer me!”

There was no answer. Only angry winds and rustling tree branches.

Erik finally allowed the tears to escape and released a howl.

“It’s not often that I see an old god weeping for a human. You’ve become far too comfortable, N’Jadaka.”

Erik flinched at the mention of his true name. He hadn’t been called by that name in centuries, by his request. After leaving the plane, he’d left that part of him behind as well. He’d left that home behind and found a home in someone else, but now she was gone. He was homeless.

“This woman,” Sekhmet continued. “She meant this much to you?”

“Don’t mock me—”

“You knew that there would be consequences—“

“Consequences?! You wanna talk to  _me_ about consequences—”

“N’jadaka! You dare to interrupt me—”

“—after you allow  _that_ woman to walk into my life—”

“ _N’jadaka_ ,” she warned.

“—let Bast give her a baby, and let her and the baby die on the same day?!”

Silence stood as Sekhmet’s answer. Winds continued to howl as people screamed about the weather and children asked about the crazy man yelling at the sky. But then—

_“Bast?”_

Sekhmet sounded confused.

Erik couldn’t find one fuck to give. 

“You don’t think I felt Bast?! Saw her working?! You think I could forget the presence of the most high after only one thousand years?!”

“I was unaware of Bast’s interference in your punishme—”

“I don’t give a fuck what you were aware of! I felt Bast the moment I touched her stomach! I felt Bast  _every time_  I touched her stomach! I prayed to Bast when it should have been  _you_!”

The ancestors’ voices hit him, forcing him to take a step back. He grunted as he fought, as he battled with the anger Sekhmet was pushing at him. He was being disrespectful, he knew, but he didn’t care. The best thing he’d ever known was taken from him and somebody needed to be held responsible. 

He took a shaky step forward.

“I was  _your_ champion!  _Your_ cherished one! I know you heard my heard begging for her not to leave me, and you let her!”

“You prayed to Bast?! Did you not even think to pray to me?!”

“You took her away from me! You  _stole_ her—”

“The human was never yours! She was sent to you to test your strength and you failed! When the ancestors speak, you are to listen! When  _I_ speak, you are to listen!”

“You banished me! I’m no longer your champion!”

“You will always be  _my_ champion!  _I_ formed you with my very fingertips!  _I_ am your supreme, and you deliberately ignored and disobeyed me for a  _human_!”

“You let them send me away! You should have fought for me the same way I fought for her! The same way I’m  _still_ fighting for her!”

“You attempted to change ranks!”

“ _You let me go_!” Erik’s voice was rough and mean, the most disrespectful he’d ever been with anyone from the ancestral plane. He took another step forward, this one sure and firm. “That human was  _my_ cherished one! She was  _my_ fucking champion! You think I need to hear about consequences after the shit you just pulled?! You think I give a fuck?!”

“ _Your champion_?!” Sekhmet exclaimed.

A sudden burst of harsh energy made him fall to his knees. It reminded him of the night of his exile, and that alone was enough to make him fight to stand. He could feel how angry this made her.

“Your champion, N’Jadaka?! Have you forgotten a champion is?! What the title entails?! And you’ve given it to a human?!”

Erik continued to fight to stand, right before Sekhmet gave an entirely humorless laugh.

“Ah,” she began. “I see now. You seem to have changed to meaning of the title ‘champion’ and turned into something…  _human_. A declaration of love, N’Jadaka?”

Little droplets of rain touched the top of his head, sinking into his dreads before a downpour began.  _The fucking rain_. As much as he still hated the rain, this did nothing to distract him from Sekhmet’s condescending tone. He’d turned it into something human? A declaration of love? Is that what he had done? He couldn’t deny it, not honestly, so he remained quiet.

What had he done?

This had to be one of the highest forms of blasphemy, if not the highest. He would never be allowed back into the ancestral plane now. But… did he care?

“Did you really believe that you would be able to live a life with this human?” Sekhmet asked, staunch arrogance lacing her words. “You are a god, N’jadaka, the champion of Sekhmet the destroyer. You do not age and you do not get sick. Your purpose on this earth is to live and to roam as an atonement for your sins.”

Erik found himself fighting back all of the tears he thought he’d cried out. What did this human do to him? What did  _Ajita_ do to him? As sacred as the title  _champion_ is, he has unwittingly turned it into something human.  _Human_. For a human woman. But he didn’t regret it. And she was dead. None of this would have happened if he had just listened and not been so fucking selfish.

“I don’t know! I don’t give a fuck! It would have worked, I would have made sure of it!” He dug a desperate hand into his tousled locs, tugging at them as his jaw trembled with all of the sobs that were trapped within his throat. A choked one slipped out. “That was… That was my family! And  _you_ took them both away from me!”

“The human world has changed you,” Sekhmet declared. She sounded disgusted. “Perhaps it was a mistake sending you here.”

“It wasn’t. The only mistake made here was me not paying attention and letting you get to her.”

Sekhmet was shocked. It was strange for her to be shocked. “This…  _human_. You truly loved her.”

Erik ignored this as more tears slipped out. He saw no point in wiping them. He felt weak and ready to go. He  _was_ ready to go. He spent far too much time on this godforsaken planet. “No consequence will ever match what you just did to me. End this punishment—”

“Surely, you must know that, that is not what I want—”

“That’s what I want!” he roared. “Kill me! Do it now!”

A slow sigh slipped past his parted lips as he remembered her, along with how her essence passed through his body as she passed on. It felt horrible then, but right now… It felt like peace.

“Please,” he whispered, his voice hard and cold. The winds stopped and the ancestors grew silent. All he could hear were his heavy breaths. He stopped fighting and surrendered to the ancestors’ will, falling to his knees with his hands braced onto the ground as he fell forward. The same position he’d taken before being cast out. 

“Please kill me.”

Silence filled the air. Not even a bird chirped.

“Very well,” Sekhmet declared.

Her voice was somber and almost sad, the last thing he heard before darkness shrouded his vision.

Erik felt nothing.

 

 

 


End file.
